Confessions of a hope fiend

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Nowitcanbe,
told-tlie amazing

story of one of

the great escapes

of all time!

This unbelievable— bnt true-
personal account could not have
been published before now.

Dr. Timothy Leary, international Pied

Piper of the connter-cnltnre, tells his

own hair-raising story— escape from

an American prison— underground adventures

fleeing the U.S. for sanctuary in

Algeria— imprisonment hy Eldridge Cleaver

and the Panthers— flight from Africa

to temporary safety in
Switzerland, only to be caught again.

CONFESSIOIIS OF A HOPS FIEND

reads like a thriller. Here is the fully

authenticated account of what

happened to Timothy Leary,

the headline hero who dared to

gamble with his life.

Editor's Note

If there are two words in the English lan-
guage which set the editorial heart throbbing
like no other, they are "in confidence." So
when the well-known international lawyer
Alan U. Schwartz, friend and representative
of important authors and publishers alike,
came to my door in the summer of 1972 with
a manuscript purportedly written by Timothy
Leary, the heart did indeed beat faster as the
nerve endings began to tingle expectantly.

I read the manuscript and was completely
taken by its combination of candor, poetry,
adventure, sly humor, political intrigue, sex
and jagged turns, twists, gaps and edges. I
thought that it was a remarkable literary doc-
ument, an exciting escape story and a juicy
journalistic account of life with Eldridge
Cleaver and crew in Algiers. With some clar-
ification of its more mysterious connections
and references, some sandpapering of the
edges, I thought, the manuscript could be pub-
lished to the delight of hundreds of thousands
of readers. Two colleagues, one younger, one
older, read the manuscript and agreed. Mr.
Schwartz and I met again. Time for some
questions.

Was this wild tale of escape and escapade
genuine? Yes, certainly, and the fugitive
could be produced if necessary to bear wit-
ness.

How did it come into your hands? Well,
now, there is a business acquaintance in
London, a PoKsh film producer, Gutowski; he
was in touch with Leary and with one Mon-
sieur Hauchard, a resident of Lausanne, Switz-
erland.

Why is this manuscript in confidence with
a paperback publisher? Very simple — the
world publication rights should be under one
roof — the publication might very well be in
paperback originally (there is some topical
urgency here). Besides, it would seem obvi-
ous that such a headline-making man and
flouter of the Law had the world literally
waiting for his story every bit as much as the
children, fathers and mothers of the Drugged
Generation in America.

And so a contract was negotiated and
drawn — the "papers" as they are called. A
quick trip to Geneva was arranged. The scene
shifts.

We gather in the lobby of the hotel Le
Richemond, sedate, velvet-upholstered, haunt
of nineteenth-century British vacationers.
And a strange gathering it is. From London,
the stocky young lawyer for Gutowski; from
the south of France, Gutowski himself; from
Lausanne nearby, Monsieur Hauchard, tall,
white-haired and gilded, host and guide for
the New York trio; and now the man of the
hour, Leary, enthusiastic, slightly Mephisto-

phelian, ready to work, very real The scene
shifts again.

A small private dining room, with a large
rectangular table covered with green felt. Us
and the papers. Talk about clauses, war-
ranties, payments, accomphces, editorial
changes, yes, no and no maybes. We know
what we must have; we have what they want;
the machinery purrs on. And overlooking this
curious group is a picture postcard painting
of Christ all aglow and the Disciples listening
intently. What would such an event be with-
out a love feast? Monsieur Hauchard has
ordered — elaborately — and we are joined by
friends of Leary: the famous Brian Barritt
of the manuscript and a young woman, Gar-
boesque in her beauty. And then the food
and wine. Cheerful conversation rippled, ego
strings plucked and soothed.

So easy then to finish the editorial part of
the job in an afternoon and evening. Timothy
Leary, actor, writer, teacher, priest, perched
cross-legged on a side chair. Can we say this
in the book? Yes. Change that? Yes, but
maybe do it this way. All present, actively
involved. Timothy Leary, now to settle in
Switzerland, to live and write, make movies
and records, wait for the signal to greet the
press and talk about Confessions of a Hope
Fiend. Each and every page of the manu-
script was initialed with a flourish. Since that
happy August day the tightly woven strands
and connections have been stretched, broken,
twisted, and here and there repaired. Were
agreements broken — and by whom? Will the

grand plan for book and film come to pass?
Leary and Switzerland just couldn't last, shall
we say. The country does not lend Itself to
charismatic figures in search of a lost audi-
ence. And as for escape to Asia with an-
other beautiful young woman — something
snapped. The long, lazy arm of the Law must
reach out from sunny Cahfornia, clap on the
manacles and bring the man home.

There was swift trial on the escape charge
and conviction. Yes, the defendant is guilty
of that crime, saith the jury (crime?). And
yet the defendant Tim Leary states that he
had a fair trial. Case closed.

Now the book is here, with a life of its
own. It is still a remarkable literary account.
The man opens his mind. It is a wild, wan-
dering adventure and a raw, jarring look at
the reahty of existence, both in our country
and the world around us.

Marc Jaffe
April 1973

Confessions

of a
Hope Fiend

TIMOTHY LEARY

A NATIONAL OENCRAL COMPANV

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

A Bantam Book/ published July 1973

All rights reserved.

Copyright © 1973 by Michel-Gustave Hauchard.

This book may not be reproduced in whole or in part, by

mimeograph or any other means, without permission.

For information address: Bantam Books, Inc.

Published simultaneously in the United States and Canada

Bantam Books are published by Bantam Books, Inc., a National
General company. Its trade-mark, consisting of the words "Bantam
Books" and the portrayal of a bantam, is registered in the United
States Patent Office and in other countries. Marca Registrada.
Bantam Books, Inc, Inc., 666 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10019,

FEINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

February 19, 1970

Orange County Superior Court

Just around midnight the jury came in with
the verdict. Dehberations had lasted all day. The
District Attorney was worried. We were bored.
Bonne Chance deals the cards. A pack of fools,
lovers, and jugglers. This deck had been shuffled
long before this day of judgment. We had gone
through the two weeks' proceedings in that som-
nambulant courtroom stupor. It had been a year
of melodramatic trials and tribulations in Texas,
New York, and Cahfornia. Three posses of the
United States Law Estabhshment slowly closing
in on us. The government had armies of prosecu-
tors. We were reheved that the chmax was about
to happen. Judicial procedures by this time were
boring charades. During the day of waiting comic
congeniality had ruled the courtroom. Two weeks'
confinement with the court clerks, bailiffs, and
sheriff's deputies had produced a cautious accept-
ance like shipwrecked survivors, passengers, and
crew thrown together on a lifeboat. It was an im-
portant case to the District Attorney. He had
assembled a jury of hanging men and women,
John Birch stereotypes, but the long wait had him

2 r CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

fngntened. When the jury sent out a request for
coffee he grabbed the bailiff's jacket, shoved the
cocked hat rakishly over his forehead, and tiptoed
around the courtroom in waiter pantomime. Big
laugh for the DA.

The verdict surprised no one. We were all found
guilty of possession, the wizard crime. S^e was
C — condemned on two counts : ten years for some
morsels of hashish and ten years for a few volts
of LSD. The young Jack was guilty of the same.
I was condemned for two roaches which had ap-
peared in the hand of the policeman who had
searched the ashtray of the car I was driving. In
both this trial and the federal trial in Laredo,
Texas, my lawyers had put up no defense. We
hoped to win the case in higher court. The at-
torneys assured that I would be immediately re-
leased on Appeal Bond. The Constitution of the
United States and all legal precedent guaranteed
bail. But the magic mantra guilty produced a
dramatic change in the Judge. The good-natured
handball partner of my lawyers suddenly re-
gressed into a grim inquisitor. We were unpre-
pared for the vindictiveness. He announced that
I would not be released on Appeal Bond but re-
manded at once to the custody of the Orange
County Sheriff as a danger to society and a menace
to the community. The fluorescent lights of the
Courtroom shimmered off his shaven head as he
waved damning documents upon which he based
his convictions. The sheriff's deputies approached.

- We will handcuff you out in the hallway so
that your wife and son won't see.

- Come back soon, she said.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 3

They pulled my hands behind my back and
slipped on the cuff s. We rode to the Orange County
Jail in a squad car. It was very efficient. The
receiving gates were opened by remote control.
Radio messages crackled back and forth between
the cruiser and headquarters. I stood under the
hard glare in front of a reception panel. The door
of a holding cell clicked open and slipped shut
behind me. There was a concrete floor with no
benches. The guards gathered around in New
Testament style and looked curiously, laughing at
the new martyr.

- For you we throw away the key. If we have
our way you'll never get out.

My cellmate, dozing, head on knees, was roused
to interest.

- How come they teU you that, man. What you
done?

- God knows, I said.

Then came those weary, lonesome jailhouse
blues. I won't be in her arms tonight.

After a long time the cell doors clicked open and
I walked into a large receiving tank. Two cons in
green trustee uniforms were behind the counter.

- Strip. Hold up your arms.

A bored con points a squirt gun and sprays my
armpits and balls with DDT.

- Bend down and close your eyes.

The hissing spray wets my head. After a shiver-
ing shower I dress in green jail clothes and pas-
sively cooperate during the long process of finger-
printing while the guards beat up a drunk Black
man in the comer.

I carried my jailhouse records up the escalator.

4 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

Guards watch silently behind armored plate glass.
It was a modem Orwelllan jail. A trustee hands
me a plastic-covered mattress, sheets, blankets,
and a towel. I feU on the soft pile with the other
depressed kids.

After a while a metal voice ordered:

- On your feet. Go down to K tank.

Behind the glass a crew-cut khaki guard points
down the hall. Control room panels around him
flash red and green. I walk down the runway, past
several eight-man holding cages. A door slides
open.

- Take the upper bunk.

I threw the mattress on the metal slab too tired
for sheets, climb up, tune out.

Early morning Ught and noise wakes me. Seven
cellmates coughing, shitting, washing, grumbling.

- Whafs happening?

- Breakfast. Sleep if you want to.

I sleep and wake to TV clamor. I sit up on the
bunk. My cellmates cluster around. A family re-
union of smiling misfits.

- You got lots of friends here.

A trustee passed cigarettes and candy through
the bars. A long-haired saint hands me the gospel
of the Buddha. There are many illuminated God-
intoxicated men in the Orange County Jail. The
buzzer sounds for lunch and the door slides open.
We march single file to the mess hall. The first
jail meal on a tin tray loaded with mucky porridge,
a tin cup with chlorinated water. I sit next to a
surly hulk with thick low brows and black hair
swept back low-ride style. His bulging arms were
covered with tattoos. There was a sky-blue nude

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND O

girl, a disney orange devil with pitchfork, a purple
etched brunette with her haunting cunt trembling
where the vein crossed for accuracy. A needle and
spoon with the motto "Junk is Fun/' He flexed his
arms and rippled muscles. I said :

- You have everything there but *'Bom to Lose*
He laughed.

- That's there on my shoulder. He pulled up
his short-sleeved shirt.

- Why the number eight? - Heroin man,
eighth letter of the alphabet. - You dig heroin?
H2O is my favorite, I replied with an aristocratic
smile. - Yeah man I love heroin, it's me, he said.

I would hke to have talked more but the guard
flicked his finger ordering us to the garbage cans.

Back in the cell the PA system called my name:
- Roll up your gear and hit the beach.

In this Orange County Jail they call the runway
in front of the cells "the beach." In the Los Angeles
Jail they call it "the freeway."

I roll the plastic-covered mattress round the
blankets while my mates cluster round.

- Good luck, man, you're bailed out.

I float happy to the tier end. Barred gates click
open. The loudspeaker rasps: Proceed to D tank.
TTie invisible eye watches me. -- Walk ten feet
and turn right. The metal gates slide apart. I was
in a new tier of single cells. - Put your gear in
D3. The third cell was empty. Metal bed, metal
table, metal toilet, metal washbowl. I threw the
mattress on the bed. You have your choice of cell
lockup or dayroom. Ten men were sitting around
. the dayroom watching TV.

A secret club smile made the circle.

6 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

- You know where you are now? Murderers*
row. The elite. This is high-power. Protective
custody for killers.

We start the ancient prisoner meeting ritual.
Whose case, what case, where case. The loud-
speaker rasps again :

- Roll up your gear.

An unseen dial opens the cell and the metal
voice directs me down hall to another cell tier.

- Welcome to N tank, protective custody for
bad actors, noncooperators, snitches, messianic
acid heads. We used to have child molesters, baby
robbers, motherfuckers, and assorted sex thieves
but theyVe been moved next door.

Here in N tank was a pretty slim boy lover, the
little brotherfucker telling tender tales of lusty
sucking twelve-year boys, pants down on the sofa,
when mother comes and screams "PohceT And
here was beautiful junior Jesus, a bearded speed-
wired acid head. Another drug martyr, mind
etched with acid and then hooked into the inces-
sant humming methedrine word tape. He was
wired day and night with a crazy smile to some
neptunian switchboard chattering authentic ga-
lactic vibrations and telepathic computer messages
nonstop. And here was "Bully Boy Wendel," pro-
tection muscle king of the jail, calling soft threats
down the tier at fearful titillated sissy girls who
threw him chewing gum, sweet chocolate kisses,
sugar-coated hcking sticks, and anal twists.

And the silent Chicano snitch kid trembling in
the corner of the cell.

And the silent giant Black who nursed psychotic

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND /

jungle rage in the shadow cave and never left for
meals.

And Tom Lynn, a twenty-year-old weak blond
Aries. He sits next to me in the TV room telling
tales of Vietnam, marijuana, Tokyo opium, acid
love rituals in army hospitals, hashish concubines
in Bangkok, shooting horse in the ladies' rooms of
filling stations where he worked. At night he
stands outside my cell pretending to sweep, lean-
ing on a broom, babbling me hip tales until the
bull bellows him back to his cell. Silence on the
tier and then each night the eerie murder voice
comes singing through the ventilators from the
next cellblock.

~ Fuck you bastard, Lynn, get ready to die,
your days are numbered.

Tom Lynn wore the jacket of snitch. He was in
protective custody to keep the midnight knife from
his back. He told this story about once upon a
crime a bad guy, Willie Madden, a low-riding
armed robber, smashed down candy-store owners
screaming for help. Willie and Tom used to shoot
horse together. Now Willie faced three life sen-
tences. He is a mean mean dude. He beats his
wife, he beats his mother, he beats store owners,
he beats his victims. His speciality is asshole-rap-
ing weak prisoners. Blood, blood, blood. Willie
blames sweet Tom for his troubles.

As I listen to this dark tale I shiver in the cold
prison mist.

Twice a week on visiting day we were herded
down to a crowded room where we looked through
the glass at our visitors janmiing into the hallway.

8 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

Each prisoner sat at an open booth and talked by
telephone through the glass window to family
and friends on the other side.

She was sitting behind the glass surrounded by
friends. She had a sad story to tell. The Judge was
unrelenting. The lawyers helpless and confused.
Newspaper editorials praised the crackdown law-
and-order policy. We felt the fear that I would
never get out from this glass separation. The
danger dials were jumping and enthusiasm low.
Her face was pressed to the glass, eyes full.

- ril free y^ujoye^ she said.

After twenty minutes the line clicks off. We act
out the silent pantomime of farewell. I return to
the metal box four feet wide, twelve feet long, ten
feet high, arrange the mattress so that it cushions
the metal stool, place a yellow legal pad on the
metal shelf, and start writing this book. For nine
days in murky pale shadow glow, sharpening the
pencil with a razor blade held in a match cover,
I wrote this jailhouse story and a detailed plan for
overthrowing the government of the United States
without violence. I wrote in a careful legible script
while eating candy bars and smoking. When my
hand cramped I walked to the mirror to peer at
my pale face, do yoga, fall in bed. Books to read
were contraband. Books to write forbidden. I hid
the sheets of this manuscript under my mattress
and waited for a lawyer's visit to smuggle them
out of prison.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

A few days before my sentencing I was called
down for a probation interview.

The PO was an excited tall broad-boned western
woman coughing cigarette smoke at me. I was
genially dignified, resigned to martydom and clas-
sified not an escape risk. She interrogated me
about schooling and mihtary record, income,
assets, stocks and bonds, criminal record, drug
use, marital history. She took notes diligently. She
wore a few strands of black hair on the back of
her hands. I dug her.

After lunch the loudspeaker squawked:

- On the line with gear rolled up. You're check-
ing out to Federal Court in Texas.

Down in the basement clothing room they
handed me a plastic bag with my London mod flan-
nel suit and soft leather desert boots. I sat waiting
for three hours in the holding cell until two burly
Blacks shouldered into the room. The Feds. County
jail guards crowded around respectfully.

- You from the FBI?

A sharp look of disdain. - Federal Marshals.

They pat me down professionally. As they bend
over I see Soviet shoulder holsters with genuine
blue-steel guns. I follow them handcuffed into a
squad car. At the Los Angeles Airport we drive
behind the terminal and switch to a local squad
car, drive on the runway dodging jetliners, and
park under the wing of a waiting plane. Three
guards watch as the handcuffs chp off and I climb

10 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

onto the plane. They keep me isolated in the
window seat until we land at Phoenix, Arizona.
- We are going to do you a favor and drop you
off at the Federal Detention Camp. You won't like
it at the Phoenix City Jail.

They stashed me in a Federal cattle cage for
two days and nights and returned bleary-eyed with
whiskey breath. We flew all night to Houston. Un-
shaved and sleepless I was shoved into a Federal
Courthouse holding cage. Two Marshals held my
arms as we walked into the Courtroom. She^was
sitting in the spectators' seat flashing love. My
lawyers looked worried. A wooden gavel banged.
His Honor, the Judge, black-robed shoulders bent,
peered down at a little gray criminal. The Judge
had a senile eye and facial twitch. His Texas
drawl clipped words like meat cleavers.

- You are a thief, the Judge said to the small
man. - And apparently a clever thief. His face
ticked.

- I sentence you to fifteen years in the Federal
Penitentiary. Twitch. The little thief sat next to
me. Our eyes met and we shrugged.

I stood below the Judge. He would not look in
my eyes. It was afternoon TV, the frowning Judge,
his twitch betraying indictable repressions frozen
into law; the Court Clerks doddering old men with
crepey faces. The fat Federal attorney covered his
three hundred pounds of white baby fat with a
dark blue suit and white socks. The veins in his
neck throbbed as he described aloud sexual fan-
tasies about young girls and bo-ays. Your Honor,
being perverted, Your Honor, corrupted, Sir, led

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 11

astray, Sir, debauched, destroyed, if it please the
Court.

We were a classic cast of outlaws. One cashiered
Harvard Alchemist in chains. One beautiful long-
haired wife with trembling dark eyes. Two plucky
young lawyers skillfully trapping the enraged
Judge into reversible errors.

I was sentenced to ten years in the Federal
Penitentiary for being in a car in which someone
else possessed less than half an ounce of mari-
juana. Like his California colleague the Judge
illegally denied normal Appeal Bond as a threat
to the social order. The lawyers forced the guards
to let me spend exactly two minutes with Hex»
She came in my arms; for the first time in weeks
we made contact. Then the Marshals moved in to
break us up.

My lawyers asked if I could write a short state-
ment for the press. They tore off a sheet of note
pad and I scribbled quickly. Love cannot be im-
prisoned.

Handcuffed, I was bustled out the Courtroom
door grinning at the leaping pack of reporters and
photographers who tripped over backward into the
bushes while cameras whirled through a forest of
microphones. I was shouldered in the squad car
and we roared away to the airport.

~ You have ten years to think about what a
big wave you made in Houston, sajd the Marshal.

I was happy to get back to my friends in the
cellblock of the Orange County Jail.

At this time I met Bud Bennett. He was a forty-
year-old junkie in for sale of heroin. He had spent

12 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

ten years in various prisons and another ten
studying yoga, smoking hash and opium on the
banks of the Ganges. He was an adept. He had
neatly balanced the Time-Space equation.

~ The prison cell is my home in Space. It's
enforced meditation. In Time you will find me in
Benares, dirtiest city in the solar system. The smell
gets stronger like a monstrous fart stinking of wet
earth. It's nice. Pilgrims stream in, pray, wash,
meditate, and cut out with added merit, each
adding to the aroma of burning flesh and open
gutter sewers. Hindus who die in Benares go direct
to heaven, a sort of baksheesh from Shiva chuck-
ling in the purple throat and pulhng up bunches
of Hindus by their tails like mandrakes. India is
free like psychedehc drugs.

Bennett offered me enlightenment straight from
headquarters, hermetically sealed and sold legally
everywhere along the Ganges.

Sitting by a deserted burning Ghat, waters of
the swollen river smash the crumbling stone, his
trust in reason streamed out of the top of his head
and mingled with the smoke of funeral pyre.
Logic died. Bennett knew he knew nothing.

— Sitting next to me was this old patriarch, the
ninety-nine names of Allah etched in Arab wrinkles

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 13

cross his face. The hookah pipe has curved stems
bound at intervals with copper wire and laid with
pale blue mosaic. Not the straight type used in
religious ceremonies that drag the smoke down
into your belly. These are gentle and smoked
sitting down. Every now and then one takes a long
draw and illuminates the dull red nova of glowing
charcoal. The water in the clay bowl gurgles like
a happy baby.

Thus Bennett began transmitting Atman
Tantra, the yoga of self-love, the secret Sadhana
of self-devotion. He said it was an ultimate key,
a neurological technique for eroticization and
maintaining a state of rapture.

He tau^t the 108 meditations of Atman
Tantra. You get off on strong hashish. Then sitting
in the lotus position in a silent room you produce
an erection thinking of the most salacious fantasy
that imagination can conjure. You maintain the
flowering stem while recalling one by one the 108
sexual visions. Deprived of external stimulation
the prisoner's nervous system grows on memories.
At each memory he flips a meditation bead. When
he reaches the 108th he screams HREE and ex-
plodes into a cosmic orgasm.

B.B. told me this story:

In Benares he met a saintly old man named Yo
Henbene. He had been a professor at the Uni-
versity but dropped out. The old man said that all
one needed in life is a crust of bread and a little
hashish every day. His disciple, Tambi, each morn-
ing brought him a bit of hashish. He lived in a
small room totally unfurnished except for a prayer
rug, a shawl, a water jug and hookah. In the next

14 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

room was a cripple with no arms or legs. A very
successful beggar. One of the local prostitutes
would carry him out to the street in the morning,
and carry him back in the evening to feed him.
Each evening the girl that he favored would put
him in a basket and pick him up to fuck him,
jigghng him up and down. He was very virile with
a big prick. As a matter of fact that is all he was.
Just a head, a trunk, and a prick. The prostitutes
conspired to see who would care for him. He was
rich and such a weird fuck. To find a guy like that
was a treasure for these girls. They had tried
everything else. The old professor next door would
meditate and dream and listen through the wall to
the music from the beggar's room.

B.B. passed on his high solitary version of
HINAYANA Buddhism. A summit ASANA which
produced an ultimate detachment. He called it the
Serpent Circle, songs of praise to the hermaphro-
ditic world snake devouring its own tail. The
adept, sitting in the lotus position after long hours
of muscle stretching, reached that point of relaxa-
tion where he could incorporate his own organ of
reproduction. At this moment, said B.B., evolution
ceases, day merges with night, male with female.
The final connection reestablished, one softly rolls
off the wheel of external desire. What else is left
to a confined nervous system? B.B. lent me his
beads, which were alternating, smooth phallic and
oval yoni forms pohshed by erotic reminiscence.

After dinner B.B. would squat Hindu fashion by
my side in the TV room and transmit his message.
During his long prison terms he had turned on

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 15

his entire body by means of a systematic sequence
of neural associations.

The first step was to develop total control of
erection and orgasm: a simple matter according
to him if the adept is provided with hashish and
soUtude enough to let the visions emerge.

The second step was to transfer erotic current
from one part of the body to another. His instruc-
tion for charging the anus was of particular inter-
est and aroused buggery flutters. Anal receptivity
was maintained by assuming in the mind Her
graceful positions. Her moist expectations and
Her breathless reactions. Imagine her as a four-
teen-year-old, cock-hungry and eager. Imagine the
Caribbean beachboy, the lusty airhne pilot. Imag-
ine her first fuck, with the high-school football
star. Imagine the first time she experienced each
sexual position. Become her sexuahty. Do her
trick. Stretch and writhe murmuring. Your ass-
hole will grow until it becomes cunt of the world,
he said.

The goal of this autoerotic Tantra was not, how-
ever, to satisfy oneself. It must be dedicated in
purity to Her amorous distraction and Her sensual
pleasure. Once you have learned exactly how the
erotic impulses are hooked up in your own body,
then you can think about making love to Her in
the style and elegance which She deserves.

And so days passed quickly, reading, writing,
lying on the soft couch of memory, listening to
the jailhoiise sound tapes, four TV sets blaring
different programs, usually cops and robbers guns
blazing and western movie shoot-outs. The eternal

16 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

clack of domino ivory on metal tables. Heavy clang
reverberations bouncing around the four-story
metal building. The iron doors clicking open, slam-
ming shut and way down below on freedom street
truck engines grind, auto horns bleep. From the
neighboring cellblocks continual arguments,
curses, and the soft rush of blood through my
arteries.

The day of sentencing arrived. I was crowded
with fifty men into a small basement holding cell.
We changed our jail wraps for street clothes. A
strange masquerade party, each man shedding the
common uniform and emerging, strange meta-
morphosis, in the costume worn at the time of the
jail crime. We all sat together on the floor suffocat-
ing with the smeU of sweaty feet for two hours
before the court bus arrived.

I was escorted to the Courtroom crowded with
flowered hippies, flashbulbs, TV cameras, reporters
clamoring for statements, ghe came over with a
deep kiss. The TV cameras pushed closer.

My lawyer asked postponement of sentence for
five days. The Judge sentenced Jack to ninety days
observation in the state prison. ^She was given
twenty years probated to six months in jail, but
is released on Appeal Bond. Perfect. She walks
free. '

Tom Lynn had a court appearance too on the
fifth day but he didn't answer the 4.00 a.m.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 17

speaker. In the dressing room I talked to Black
Panthers about the Chicago trial. In the comer of
the room my friend the low-browed tattooed man
waved. He was in the center of a group talking
about Tom, denouncing him, condemning him to
death.

I asked if it was not true that Willie Madden's
own father had given him up. My question puzzled
the tattooed man.

- Hey. I'm Willie Madden. Do you get sentenced
today? Good. Me too. We'll go up to prison together
on the Chino chain. You can run with us. We'll
protect you. We'll get you one of those nice young
bitches to fuck. Willie's face twisted in a perfectly
evil smile. You pick a weak kid. Tell him bend
over. If he don't you just fire on him. Smash. Make
his blood run. WiUie made violent motions with
his hands. Knock him down. Kick him around.
OK, punk. You ready now? Take your fist like this
and push it against his face. OK, little soft punk
your tender asshole ready now? Pull his pants
down. Run some soap on your prick. Punk him
good. Punch him if he struggles. Hear him scream.
After that, he's your eager bitch. Runs errands
for you. When he sees you coming he's glad he's
your bitch 'cause you protect him. Willie was
smiling in a friendly way.

The guard came to the cage door. Lynn. Is
Thomas Lynn in there? There was an electric
silence. No one talked.

- They didn't call him down from N tank, I
said.

- He's on the hst for court. I'll get him.

The bull trampled ofP to get Lynn. Tension in

18 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

the room. A horror movie was starting. No one
talked. Willie's gang surrounded him.

Then the guard unlocked the gate. Tom Lynn,
looking miserable, hesitated, waited, then walked
one pace forward. The gate brushed his back as it
closed.

I was standing next to Willie facing Tom, who
stood hands by his sides. He looked at me beseech-
ingly. I left Willie and walked to Tom. We got on
the Coxirthouse bus together. The bus drove into
the basement of the Courthouse. The Superior
Court cases were locked in a large holding room.
There were benches around the sides and a bench
in the middle. I sat with Tom in the middle. Willie
and his gang were behind us. Danger meters flash-
ing red. A few moments later it struck. A blurred
swift movement in the air. The noise of flesh
crunching. Tom was standing arms at his sides,
face bloodied, dazed, his glasses smashed on the
floor. Willie was dancing, fists moving in to attack,
I stood up and moved between the two.

- Wait a minute.

Willie was surprised. Tom swayed. The three of
us were poised, waiting for something to happen.
I spim out some West Point memory tape.

- Guard!

As the bull approached I said, - Take this man

to the hospital, he's sick. The guard almost saluted.

A wave of muttering moved through the room.

- Man, what did you do that for. Motherfucking
snitch should die.

I sat down shook up. The tattooed swastikas
might be mad at me. After a long silence the Black
Panthers called over to me, waving to join them.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 19

- Got any of that bad acid man? They laughed
and we went on talking about drugs and revolu-
tion.

After a while I went over to Willie. He talked
with jittery speed.

- Man you should never have done that. I al-
most fired on you out of instinct. I had to kick ass.
That's our way, man, with a snitch.

I was called upstairs to the Courtroom and
given a ten-year sentence, jihe cried. The Court
was crowded with hippies who were chanting
OMMMMM. The Judge shouted that if that
humming didn't stop he put them all in jail.

The guards pulled me out of the Court.

Back in the dressing room Willie told me more
about Tom.

- He's a weak sniveling punk, man. A bom
snitch. He caused me trouble before. We had this
place near Palm Springs. Used it for a hideout. It
was loaded with guns and heroin. One weekend
there was this underaged girl that the heat was
looking for and man, they came to the door, man.
They were looking for this girl, man, and I said
get a warrant. They said they would. So the other
dudes covered the side doors, man, and I got a
shotgun and two pistols and waited at the end of
the hallway. I told my old lady to answer the door
but when the heat came the sixteen-year-old girl
went to the door and gave herself up.

So we piled the guns in the car, man, and drove
back and I was in my kitchen, man, and someone
said, Tom Lynn is in the living room. I went in and
he said what's happening Willie, I want to talk to

20 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

you. I asked him if he had given the heat our
address and he said, yeah, I did it for your own
good. I started to move on him man, and he was
backing away holding his hands down hke this
saying, wait a minute Willie. Lennie said kill the
fucker and my old lady said blow the dude away.
He backed out the door and I fired on him and he
fell off the second-story porch and ran away.

He's weak. He lies about stuff too, pretending to
have a heroin habit. Hey man, Fm strung out. Give
me a fix. So I gave him a quarter spoon and he
fixed and man in five minutes he was dying of an
OD. Dying, man. Everyone said throw his body in
the car and well dump him, but I said no, and
dragged him to the bathtub, and filled it with cold
water and gave him mouth-to-mouth resuscitation
and got ice cubes and put them under his balls
and saved the fucking dude's life, man. Ask him
about that when you get upstairs.

- You rob to support your habit?

- I gotta have my stuff. Heroin is me, man.
That's when Fm myself. I'd rather fix than fuck
anytime. He turned to his assistant. Mike, you
rather fix or fuck. Mike produced an honest grin.

- Fuck man. Fuck. He pushed his right fist up
and down masturbatory over his vein.

- If heroin was legal you'd be out of a job, I
said.

- You're right, but we'd stiU need guns against
snitches.

- If heroin were legal snitches would be out of
a job too.

The morning after sentencing the orders came
through transferring me to the State Prison. Emi-
gration from short-time County Jail to long-term
penitentiary. In the basement holding tank,
stripped of county wrappings, I dressed for the
final time in mod flannels.

I was stored in a special isolated holding tank
until the County Jail bus drove through the smoggy
freeways to the Prison Reception Center at Chino,
California. The welcoming conmciittee was grim
and blunt.

- Strip naked. Throw your personal belongings
in the box. Bend over for body inspection. Run
your hands through your hair, both your ears. Open
your mouth. Wag your tongue. Lift your balls.
Turn around spread your buttocks. Left foot. Right
foot. Shower.

I dressed in the new prison uniform. A tall Black
in blue danced over. He gave me ten hand-rolled
cigarettes. The rumor wind was blowing round me.
They gonna put you in the hole. The Captain wants
to see you. They gonna ship you to the Medical
Center at VacaviUe. You're getting bailed out to-
morrow.

The sergeant checks us for long hair and orders

22 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

me to the barber. I get a last mirror glimpse at
forest hair and moustache. - Leave as much as
you can I ask the barber, but he grunts and clips.
In the mirror I see a strange high-headed youth.

- Don't complain man you look twenty years
younger.

I took sheets and blankets and followed the
sergeant to solitary confinement. It's bad-boy
lockup for you.

I walk by the cages of the dangerous wild
men. They shout in pleasure to see me. A Black
shouts : - Hey man we gotta talk to you. We can-
not see each other. Just cries from cage to cage.
A nasty Brooklyn voice denounces me. - Oh he's
that bad man! Hang him. Another Black defended
me. Shorty's Brooklyn voice turns friendly.

- Hey Doc, look at these pictures. A hand from
the next cell appears holding color snapshots. Sad-
eyed blue wife and clear-eyed kids.

- Hey Doc, here's a record of my trial. Read it.

- Hey Doc, you want some cigarettes. - Hey
Doc, you need some stamps and envelopes. — Hey
Doc, you wanna a Playboy magazine?

Dinner was passed through a slot in the bars of
the narrow white counter box. Then began the
evening sport. Blacks using mirrors to catch the
setting sun, playing sunshine tag, racing reflected
birds of light against the waU. Laughing and
shouting. At the hour of romance, from Her soli-
tary cell a young lady sadly coos a soft message and
a Black voice rumbles back; - You Sandy I going
to get you ass. What I'm gonna to do to you girl I
Hoooeee. I got me twenty inches for you. You my
pussy.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 23

- Oh no big boy, Fm my own girl from now on.
No more marriage for me.

- Great God almighty, I gotta get me some
sweet red meat. I sick to death of my own right
hand. Wheeee — here I come Sandy. Ohhhhh what
Fm gonna to do to you sister. I gonna to spht your
velvet asshole girl. Stuff my tool up your belly,
split yo kidneys girl. Gonna penetrate your guts
little girl. Gut you baby so you gonna never be able
to walk again.

Sandy's voice came softly breathing:

- Oh Mr. Guard let that man out. Oh let him
loose. I needs that man. Roaring laughter sweeps
the three-story house. Eighty males poke head
through ceU bars and dig the action. Like love play
always the pulsing action peaks, subsides, and then
Shorty's voice shouts ;

- Hey Doc, look out. He cackles laughter. My
head through the bars I look down at a fire blazing
on the floor below. Flames six feet high leap up
burning sheets, blankets, discarded clothes. Wild
screams, pleasure, rage echoes through the prison
hall. Yeah man burn the motherfucking joint
down. Yeah man bum it to the ground. Burn baby,
bum.

A momentary reflex, fear of being trapped in a
cell holocaust was calmed by the cement steel of
maximum security. One angry Black voice pro-
tests the fire but he is howled down.* An incendiary
quarrel flares up between two African powers.

- Why you shit-faced motherfucking sissy
gonna to bum down this estabhshment. You stay
out of this you hear.

- Yeah bo. You'se dead you fool. If I get out of

24 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

this cell tomorrow I'se going to whip yo ass so hard
you gonna die. Motherfucker. You hear me?

- Yeah bo, you scare me.

- Don*t yeah bo me. Whaf s yo name?

- My name is Shackleforth baby.

- Well you poor fool Shackleforth, you dead,

- Oohhh. Tse frightened.

Next morning I am called to the Captain's office;
sit watching trustees run the prison, typing, phon-
ing, filing, serious responsible people working
proudly. They flash condescension. Fm a new ar-
rival. Into the room tottered an old prizefighter,
face seamed with veins, warts, and blemishes. He
was wearing khaki and silver bars. Captain Brean
waved me into his office.

- We've finally got you, huh. You are going to
be with us a long time. Ha ha. His little eyes
peered out through skin drapes.

- You're smaller than on TV. I guess we cut
you down to size, huh. He leaned back in his chair.

- I am going to talk to you man to man. You
could cause us a lot of trouble here if you wanted
to. I can size up a man. You are a born leader I
know. I am too. You could start a rebellion if you
wanted to. I know that.

He leaned forward poking his finger at me.
— But we know our business here. We are watch-
ing these long-haired hippies hanging round out-
side. Same hke that Cleaver in Vacaville. A big
crowd came around wanting to release him. A
thousand hippies could storm this place and get
inside the gates. Yeah, I grant you that. But I
tell you not one of them would get out of here alive.

I sent gentle thoughts to his head and soothed

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 25

his fevered neurons. This is the moment to suggest
that I am a cooperative nonviolent person.

He was smihng to himself as I left the room. I
was hoping he would tell them up in Sacramento,
- I know how to handle him, he'll cause no
trouble.

The next day I am moved to the main line. The
prison is crowded. Eighty men sleep in double
bunk beds on a tier floor. I share twelve square
feet with seven criminals in smooth harmony.
Jiggs, a lifelong addict, thin as a needle, spoons
up to my bunk. - Answer me one question. How
long man? How long is this going to go on?

On Easter Sunday, our sepulchers are rent by
a comedian guard who swaggers down the aisle,
cop cap rakish shouting:

- Easter egg hunt starts in twenty minutes!
After breakfast the guard walks up to me and

smiles. — We're moving you to a cell. You got a
new cellmate. I waited at the bars and watched.
After a while a rustle of excitement and coming
through the gate and carrying his blanket, his
beard gone, his long hair cut, young and vulnera-
ble comes Jack. His face lit up. We went out into
the yard and sat on the grass exchanging notes,
happy to be together.

We stayed up all night talking. He was to leave
in the morning on the chain to Tracy Prison. After
a silence I said : - If I get out first I will do every-
thing I can to get you out.

- If I get out first I will do everything I can to
get you out, he said.

At 3:00 A.M. a flashlight in the cell. The guard
whispered:

26 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

- Roll up you gear for transfer.

I could see Jack's shadow form collecting his
prison things. As he left the dark cell he whis-
pered:

- Good-bye, I love you.

- Good-bye, I love you.

I haven't seen him since.

New prisoners remained in the Reception Center
for an average of six weeks. After psychological
testing, observation, and case worker interviews a
decision is made as to the long-term prison. Usu-
ally the counselors were the deciding voice.

I spent the first week asking questions, listen-
ing, and watching. Trying to figure out how this
Reception Station worked. The lawyers were still
talking optimistically about getting me out on bail,
but the jailhouse gurus warned that this Govern-
ment would keep me in prison for the next ten
years.

They were throwing the book at drug cases.

The prison administration could deal with
armed robbers, murderers, and normal criminals
but not these defiant guiltless long-haired dopers.
The guards said armed robbers and murderers
have guts. Drug users are cowardly escapists.

Each inmate had a file called "The Jacket."
Every unusual action by the prisoner was entered
in The Jacket. But the case worker's recommenda-
tion was the key.

I found out about the network of the California

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 27

prison system, listening to sad vacation discus-
sions about the selection of prisons continually
reviewing the escape possibilities.

Tehachapi Prison is in the mountains. Fresh
air, no smog, new buildings. Too remote for visi-
tors. They send young cons there.

- Are there gun towers?

- Yeah, it's escape-proof.

The Cahfornia Institute for Men, abbreviated
CIM, offered color TV, a golf course, a swimming
pool. No wall. They'll never send you there with a
ten-year federal hold. CIM is treatment oriented.
They call you mister.

San Quentin is the Monte Carlo glamour, sex,
dope prison of the system. Near San Francisco.
Plenty of action. Gambling, educational courses,
and special visitors from San Francisco. They
might send you to Quentin, making an example
out of you. There is no escape from Quentin.

Then there was Folsom Prison. Lissen man, I
put twenty-three years in Californian prisons and
I tell you the best joint is Folsom; any experienced
con will tell you that. No kids there. You do your
time quietly.

Then there was Soledad. Dread pit of solitude
for the toughest gunsel muscle benders. They
called it the "Gladiators' School." When you check
in there they issue you a sword and a garbage can
lid. A continual fight to prove how tough you are.
Homosexual rape of soft kids. Soledad. The name
itself sent a chiU through every spine.

CMC East — California Men's Colony, San Luis
Obispo is the new science-fiction prison. Four sep-
arate quads, TV monitors. Big brother eyes watch

28 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

every move. It was called medium security, but
don't believe it. Huey Newton is there. Gun towers
with sharpshooter guards can kill at a mile range.
No one escapes. CMC West — California Men's
Colony, San Luis Obispo is the old man's home.
They send professional long-term prisoners there.
It's a country club for elite cons. The best prison
in the world. It's an easy escape.

No wall. The highway runs nearby. They send
only nonviolent prisoners there. They will never
send you there not v^dth two dimes hanging round
your neck. There is a rule that with a federal hold
they cannot send you to minimum security. The
State of California owes the Feds ten years of your
life.

The Vacaville main line is a mental hospital for
violent maniacs. They might send you there to use
your psychological training. It is maximum se-
curity. No one escapes from there.

Then there are the Forestry Camps. That's ideal,
man. You work up in the healthy mountains.
There's plenty of dope, no fences, you work along
the highway. It's simple to run away. Cons jump
Forestry Camp aU the time but they get caught.
They always run back home. They get a Dear John
letter from their wives or suspect their wives fool-
ing around, they flip, take off, and hitchhike home.
They walk in the door and bang the State Police
are waiting. The first thing they do if you escape
is stake out your home. There is no chance they'll
send you to a Forestry Camp, not with all the
time you brought here. They wall take no chances
with you.

Lying in my bunk at night creating realities.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 29

Transfer to a Forestry Camp or to San Luis Obispo.
I am a nonviolent person with no risk of escape.
After dinner, just before the night lockup I am
leaning over the third-tier railings and looking
through dirty windows to the sunset lawn below.
The cabin class deck of a slow liner going no-
where.

- Here we are again man.

He is waiting for the Vacaville chain and pumps
me for information about the sissies there. He
dreams of Vacaville Prison as a bawdy sexual
paradise. The beautiful queens of Vacaville dig the
cells with mirrors.

- Oh mercy me, he bellows. I can't wait to
meet those luscious young ladies at Vacaville. Tm
going to walk up there with mah dick in mah
hand.

A comedian guard tramples by our cells, his
shoulders hunched.

- Timothy, do you want me to help you get out
of here?

- Sure.

- OK. I gotta a great lawyer.

He walked past my cell then reappears going
down the stairs.

- Except I gotta get him out first ha ha ha.

I am a temporary process case : one who comes
and goes every six weeks. There is a permanent
work crew, abbreviated PWC. Thes^ men are seri-
ous bureaucrats who sleep in a special honor dorm
and strut through the prison like junior guards.
Among them are five men who run the five key
offices in the prison. The PWC runs the show.
For the first two weeks I am watching them and

30 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

they are watching me across the gulf of mutual
surveillance. I need their help to plan my escape.
They are checking me out of curiosity.

By this time all the smart hustling new process
cases have managed jobs in the prison offices.

The apparent power center of the prison is the
Receiving and Release Section. The action is there.
The coming and the going. The center of trade
and commerce. I spend my free time doing yoga in
the sun and playing handball.

A trustee named Talbot called me iijto his office.
He ran a small records office. He was the most
influential man in the prison : intelligent, affable,
and a born rebel. He was the jailhouse lawyer.
He spent much of his time using the prison
mimeograph machine to prepare briefs for other
prisoners. He was cool about payoff. No heavy
ransoms. Perhaps a carton or two of cigarettes.
Everyone knew he was writing briefs for kicks.
One out of every twenty briefs he wrote resulted in
some action, llie prison administration tolerated
him as a good dealer all round. His briefs kept
a thread of hope alive in the permanent work crew
and if the trustees were happy the prison ran
smoothly.

Talbot expressed interest in my appeal briefs.
After a few explanatory legal conversations he
offered me a job as his assistant. It was a plum.
An office of my own, larger than the Captain's. I
would spend twenty minutes a day typing out a
few file cards. I move to the honor dorm, have
the day free to write my own briefs or read in the
serenity of my private office. I would be considered
as a candidate for the Permanent Work Crew.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 31

- Do you think the Captain would approve of me
getting an inside job?

Talbot smiled. - We tell the Captain what he is
supposed to think. The Captain is coming round
to see that it would be a great feather in his cap
if he could keep you quiet in the prison system.

In two days I was transferred to the honor
dorm. The top cons began treating me with solic-
itude. Our dining room was the officers' mess.
The barbershop in our cellblock offered face
massages and special shampoos. Prohibited mag-
azines appeared in my cell. Free from cell lockup
both day and night. At the Friday night movie I
could sit suicidally depressed in the front row
eating trustee popcorn. And there was dope. The
lunch pail express, sidehne of bribed guards who
kept the flow of illegal contraband moving in and
out.

I had a single cell with all its implications. The
quest for the serpent who swallows his own tail.
It is just a matter of connecting neural wires he
told me.

A friendly Chicano ran the psychological test-
ing room. I was tested individually and not in the
routine group. The Chicano was smiUng and made
me coffee. It's a joke for us to be testing you he
said. You designed some of the tests we use.

The test of intelUgence is to get the highest
possible score. The test of personality is to appear
normal and to avoid manic-aggressive manifesta-
tions. Vocational tests revealed aptitude in fores-
try; nature, farming, and incompetence in clerical
tasks.

I spent every free moment on the prison yard

32 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

either at handball, yoga, or lifting metal weights
to the point of pain-strain.

Prisoners here talk about their case, their arrest,
their trial, and the next destination. Everyone
has a hope habit of one kind or another.

I am getting to know the permanent work crew
trustees. For the most part they are older white-
collar criminals with potbellies. My two protectors
were sincere libertarians. We had long discussions
about my appeal for bail, and failing that which
long-term prison would be my next home. They
were hoping to keep me with them at Chino but I
asked them to help me get the no-escape-risk ticket
so that I could be sent to Forestry Camp.

In one of the offices the trustees have posted
a big red calendar on the wall. Each day a number
was removed. I noticed the big red arrow always
pointed to tomorrow. There was no number for
today. I asked the trustee about it. He said that in
con terminology when you wake up in the morning
that day is as good as over,

I was interested in the composition of the prison
population. Half of the prisoners, the younger
half, were dopers, guiltless spirits. Black and
White, totally detached from the system, certain
of their alchemical beliefs.

The alchemical magic spread swiftly. After ten
years there were millions who chose the super-
stitious perspective, seeking to stay high.

The prison guards are retired enlisted men.
They act like motel clerks opening the dining
room, locking and unlocking doors for us. They
walk the tiers at night while we sleep; fatigued

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 33

men with flashlights slipping mail under our cell
doors. Their work centers around keys.

The lawyers say that any day the California
Supreme Court will grant me bail. My advisers
shrug skeptically.

An older guard suddenly gets down on my case.
He orders me to the barbershop, searches my cell
and finds dust, orders me back to the barbershop
for a closer trim, writes me up for petty misde-
meanors.

He stops me as I swing high and happy down
the cavernous hall of the main line and orders
me to remove the red handkerchief tied around my
throat.

We stand in the prison corridor looking at each
other separated, his eyes dull with tired hatred.
— Watch yourself, he muttered.

Talbot the trustee watched the interaction
through the glass window of his office.

- Well, there you have it, he said, the basic
confrontation of politics. The guard and the
prisoner. Two men are looking into each other's
eyes defiantly across the abyss of slavery. Every-
one in the world is on the side of the guard or on
the side of the prisoner. Pohce, lawyers, judges,
prison guards. Criminals are the opposing militia.
The forces are exactly even. Law-and-order people
control the press and the media of communication
and education but they fool no onq. At any mo-
ment at least half of the world population is in
open conscious opposition to government. Most
cops accept that it's a war on crime. So do most
prisoners.

34 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

The prison dope supply became irregular and
during periods of neurological famine, waves of
nervousness would overcome me. I was waiting
for the verdict of the California Supreme Court,
waiting for the call to the sergeant's office to re-
ceive the telegram.

I was waiting for the Counselor's interview. I
learned all I could about her. She was a Black
social worker, nicknamed "San Quentin Sally,"
famous for hard custody-oriented maximum se-
curity recommendations. She was cynical and
suspicious of being conned. She respected convicts
who told the truth, so I did. I had heard details
about her domestic problems, her marital history,
her previous employment, her emotional charac-
teristics, and her neurotic symptomatology. I
walked into her office smiling politely.

The same guard continued to ride me. When
I asked Talbot about it he tried to explain.

- You see, that particular guard has a teen-aged
daughter. He knows she smokes pot and low-rides
with a kid who deals reds. In his mind he can see
the nipples of his daughter Penny trembling
under the hypnotic passes of dope pushers, her
thin white legs contorted in yoga positions,
offering her flower cunt for the demon drug. His
daughter Penny, with fingers of limp hair be-
draggled with cannabis smoke and the expression
of total rapture on her innocent face. Man, he
can see the pusher in his mod suit with satin

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 35

cuffs propped up among the pillows on a fur-
coated bed resting ermine boots on the antique
coffee table, running the palm of his evil hands
across the hard sharp nipples of Penny's breasts.
He sees her kneeling unzipping his pants. And
you wonder why he hates you? He's not the only
one. They say you don't deserve equal treatment.
Can you dig that? Equal treatment.

After breakfast a sturdy executive elite con
named Milton, the sergeant's clerk, came over to
my table. ~ Were you expecting some sort of Court
action?

- Yes, it should be here today.

- Well, I just heard on the radio that they shot
you down. The California Appeals Court denied
your appeal, you and Huey Newton. I'm sorry to
be so blunt, but you might as well know about it.

- It is up to Justice Douglas now, I said.

I spent the day inside of gloom. My legal life
now depended upon William O. Douglas, natural-
ist, rebel, friend of youth, solace of the persecuted,
outspoken libertarian, hope of the friendless, the
husband of the girl, protector of wild flowers and
clear streams. But, he is old. It all depends on
whether his young wife smokes it or not.

During the next few days I reclined in the
monastic peace of single cell reading newspaper
stories about the pending impeachment of Justice
Douglas. My case comes before h^m at a crucial
time in his life. Freeing me on bail will bring down
on his head more angry outcries. It's a soap opera.

The lawyers assure me I'll be freed by Justice
Douglas in five days. I am still working on the
escape plan while the trustees gather around to

36 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

share the fruits of prison grapevine. The admin-
istration is meeting this week to decide where I
am going to be transferred.

I will be out on bail soon so it doesn't matter
really, but what are the possibilities?

The espionage system reported that Custody
was easier on me than Treatment. The psychol-
ogist wanted to send me to Quentin to make an
example of me. - Captain Brean here thinks they
should keep you here.

- I can't stay here, I said. I want to get to
Forestry Camp or San Luis Obispo where they let
prisoners have gardens.

Talbot smiled.

-- What you are asking me to do with the
Captain is to do nothing, right? I can dig it, he
said.

It was Monday morning in the office. I've been
in prison for nine weeks. Friday night is the worst
time.

I visit the next-door neighbor to hit his coffeepot.
He tore off three numbers — Saturday, Sunday,
Monday. Something good is going to happen this
week. During the morning we make arrangements
for writing each other when I leave.

Late in the afternoon a clerk leaned in the door.
— Well, you are going. He was waving a mimeo-
graphed sheet.

- Shipping out to CMC West.

The trustees came crowding round. — CMC

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 37

West is a country club, man, the best prison in
the world. They have a golf course. No lockup.
It's three bunk counts a day. There's a bowling
alley. They are all long-term cons just living
quietly. There are no young cons there burning
sheets. Picnic visits on the yard. Visitors can buy
lunch at the visiting room. Fried chicken. You
eat like a king.

Some cons love it there so much they hate to
leave. When they get paroled they violate so that
they can get sent back. You have private radios
there. No smog. Near the ocean. You can plant
your own garden. Contact visits! Conspiracy of
breath. Touch. Change. New scene. I'm thinking
about that fence near Highway 1.

Spent the rest of the day collecting my personal
gear to ship out. Two ball-point pens, some rubber
shower shoes given to me by an old murderer, two
packages of rolling tobacco. We travel light.

~ No gun towers or walls there?

— Just low fence. Minimimi security.

Dying on the prison mattress my mind peers at
itself through the window of a luxurious beach
house in Santa Monica.

, She^ is lying naked in front of the fire. Janis
Joplin sings from a portable tape deck on a low
womb-shaped table almost buried amongst the
furs. The breath of the fire moistens the room.

- All I want is to feel good, ,ghe^ says and falls
back amongst the cushions.

He is nervous. ~ I haven't fucked in a month,
baby.

- Just keep me high,,ghejnurmurs. Guilt is an
abstraction, pleasure is real.

^he lay unmoving, evidently under the effect
of some narcotic. He raised her leg, showing the
words "Made in_StJ^ouis,'' walked to the window
and pressed his face against the glass.

§he^stood naked in front of the fire, weeping.

It was three o'clock in the morning. A flashhght
whispering yellow. Get up I You're on the list for
transfer. Roll up all gear. Report below. Your
cell's unlocked.

I leave the rodent cage, run right down the
molecular runway, left down lattice stairs turn
right.

40 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

Forty-eight men in blue waiting in a dark tunnel
of the maximum security prison, rolHng weed,
coughing smoke, reciting their sorrows. Career
cons. The impenitent nobility. Gallant slaves.

As the world of an empress is decked with pen-
nants, Hers was decorated with desire. Wherever
she went She was invested with this cloud of male
vitality.

I walk the length of the Release Room of the
State Prison, a naked captive, carrying shoes to
the exit cage counter. Gentlemen, Fm checking
out. Could you have my bill ready? The guard
frowns down at levity. Yeah, you owe us ten long
years. Forty-eight men dressed in white jump
suits, from a gray line waiting for the bus to long-
term. All aboard for CMC East, CMC West, grim
Soledad, San Quentin, Folsom, and Forestry
Camps north.

Each man walks shivering in the morning fog
to the loading platform. Searched, handcuffed.
After pat-down, I hold hands up for bracelets. The
Lieutenant grumbles.

- Skip the cuffs for him. He's minimum secu-
rity. You pass out matches and rolling smokes.

I walk down the bus aisle. Fasten seat belts
gentlemen and ladies. Select your weed. Inside
dope. Acapulco Gold. Tehachapi Red. Quentin
Green. Metal-clad hands reach up beseeching nico-
tine.

As the mobile prison rumbles along the polluted
L.A. freeways, we look down at commuters dron-
ing to work.

Around Ventura the bus bursts out of the L.A.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 41

fog to wide blue Pacific seascapes, sparkling vi-
sions for prison eyes.

Slender girls twisting long sunny hair on the
Ventura streets. Our shackled slave wagon climbs
the hill to a white-marbled courthouse. Picking up
long-haired parole violators. In the rear-cage com-
partment the armed guard pushes brown-paper
food sacks through a metal slot. I serve lunch and
as a good trustee get a double helping. I give it to a
young Black carrying a hfe sentence.

Bouncing along Highway 101. A scenic tour.
Gulls circling wind-swept beaches. A boy and girl
walk hand in hand. At Santa Barbara rainbow
oil sHcks gleam in the noon sun.

The old Black junkie next to me offers a filter
cigarette, lights a Pall Mall for himself.

I doze dreaming that she and I ran away from
Mobile Alabama in September. We escaped by
jumping over the fence. We had never been to
Algeria before and were very anxious to meet
famous, sexy people like Jane Fonda and Huey
Newton. Our fantasies did not include the calcu-
lated ogle of the pimp's talent scout. We expected
to find a friendly community of East Village freaks
and comrade revolutionaries.

On our second day in Algiers a friendly middle-
aged Jewish social worker told us we could stay
with her cousin who lived in an apartment near
Muhammad Cinq. We said no. She was a true
believer of some sort. She took us to meet a long-
hair Yippie who convinced us it was all right.

We taxied to the apartment where we were
locked up with another runaway, a beautiful black-

42 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

haired Algerian girl our age who explained what
was expected. We were to call and write our
friends to come visit us. The first day the friend
arrived it would cost him a hundred dollars. If he
stayed longer it would cost fifty dollars a day.
We would get ten dollars or more a day depending
on how long we could keep him.

For the first month, two out of every six visitors
would be working for the Boss. If we tried to use
any of our Johns to escape, our cheeks, our fore-
heads, or the back of our necks would be cut, and
the boss psychiatrist would pronounce us insane
for wanting to escape. If we tried to escape a
second time, our faces would be cut from above
our left eyes, across our noses, to below the right
side of our jaw. And acid would be thrown on
our heads. That final punishment was intended
to destroy our credibility. The assumption was that
our credibihty meant more to us than our freedom.

We told everyone, friends, family, lawyers, po-
litical leaders, that we were being held against our
wiU. Of the first ten visitors, two turned us in.
The eight friends promised help, but were too
scared to do anything.

Sometimes we felt guilty for wanting to escape
and for not cooperating. We wondered if we could
learn to like it. After all he did want us, wanted
to keep us, saw us as having a certain value;
whereas, our friends seemed to think that it was
our fault for running away. Sometimes it seemed
to us that the world was just a series of prisons
and all we could do was to choose the jail that
allowed us to be together.

- Hey man. There's your new home.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 43

California Men's Colony West. San Luis Obispo.
Minimum Security. Just what I wanted.

The bus turns off the coastway and groans up
the winding road past army barracks. Fm glued to
the window looking for the fence. It's metal hnk
chain. Twelve feet high. Plus three strands of
barbed wire.

Guards open the gate. Enter here the city of
desolation. Sorrowtown. The instinct to imprison
is genetic. Segregate the mutant seed. Peniten-
tiaries filled with virile Blacks. Lost creation.
Spilled sperm on the prison sheets. Wooden bar-
racks. Flower lawns. Blue denim inmates watch
us. Justice is the architect. Chuckles on the bus.

- Hey man. This is the end of the hne. Old
cons come here. It's the criminal retirement vil-
lage. The Department of Correction sent you here
to die.

I'm the only one dropped off here. Crinkled
convict faces. Dead eyes watering the gardens,
watching, incurious. I wave farewell to my
shackled bus friends and walk into the Receiving
Room. The guards stare. It's like checking into a
paid vacation retirement village. I radiate docihty.
Lay down all hope you that go with me.

An old, long-time bail boy takes me to my cell-
block with tender dignity. Musty smell of caged
bodies. Beloved husband. We left San Francisco!
Airport four hours late.

Clothing distribution. I draw three sets of new
stiff blue denims. Jobie swept us up at the airport^
in a limousine: My number stenciled on the clothes,
A crowd of inmates round my bunk. I go to the
prison library to see what old friends have written.

44 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

Alan Watts. William James. Lucretius. Epicurus.
Pythagoras. Time-Traveler post office. We stopped

[for papaya juice on 86th Street. It was delicious.

Dinner call. Stooped men in blue scrambling to

the mess hall like hungry children. Roses green

^nd red in prison windows. I thought to visit the

l^illbrook estate while Ym east. Sensual impres-
sions are a form of food. On metal trays.

A guard shakes his head. - You don't belong
here, he said.

Leaving the mess hall a friendly fellow shows
me the prison grounds. The totally institutionalized
are sent here. Professional prisoners. It must be

(lovely there this month my love. This is a graduate
school of crime.

- Library. Spits. Music room. Education build-
ing. Laundry. Spits. Barbershop. Spits. Lemme
give you some a-vise. Doan truss no one here. Spits.
This place is filled with snakes and lyres. Sons of
snitches. Spits. Break your spirit. Spits. Old cons
are cranky. Spits. Man, they're dying like it's going
outa style. Spits. Doan be a fool. Sure it looks nice
here. Flowers and trees. But it's a dismal place.
Spits. People come around to give you a-vise. Spits*
Listen! Don't listen to them. Spits.

^ Return to my bunk. It's dawn now in Manhattan.

IJThe sky gray over the East River. There's a visiting
lawn with picnic tables. You are not yet asleep

\back there. Where we can visit weekends. I am

with you. The old Black on the next bunk, wise

reptile, neck craned, watches fellow swamp crea-

C*tures. 7 kiss your mouth with my hands on your

\cheeks. He is sewing leather bags. He chuckles.

Every buddy come look for you. They ask where

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 45

that man that sleep here. He laughs. This is myj
perfume. This is not life. And yet it is not death.
I love you, husband.

When she comes gleeful fucking she smiles like
a little girl and her eyes shine in pure joy.

- Lookit man. They coming now to talk to you.
A tense shrew sly pornographer. Bzzzzz. Fm

like you. I fight the system. Bzzzzz. They hate me
here. The parole board won't give me a date. Bzzzz.
I used to be a member of the estabhshment. Fm
bitter now. Bzzzz. What Fve seen! Filthy rotten
bastards. Now I am a revolutionary like you. Pigsl
Bzzzzz. You have no idea how much money I made
outside. Let me give you piece of advice. Lissen
seriously. It's a jungle! Do not, I repeat, do not
trust anyone I Do not listen to any piece of advice.
Beware! Fm telling you these people are sick!
Bzzzzzz. Neurotic, psychotic, psychopathic. Do not
believe anyone. Only one out of twenty here has
his marbles. Bzzzzzzz. Sex perverts, child mo-
lesters, snitches, robbers, murderers, psychopaths.
Do not trust anyone.

A sullen thug calls me aside. Grrrrrr. Listen,
Doc. Fm your follower. On your side. Grrrrr. Listen
to a piece of advice. Cocksuckers. Grrrrrr. Need
anything, Doc? Cigarettes? Envelopes? This cock-
sucking place. Grrrrr. Don't trust these cocksuck-
ers. Grrrrr. See that fellow on your bed. Grrrrrr.
Cocksucker. Doan truss him. I killed a man. Now
the cocksucking parole board think Fm violent.
Grrrrrr. I don't take no shit from them. Cocksuck-
ers. Why do they think Fm violent? Grrrrrr. I'll get
get you cigarettes, Doc. Remember I told you.

- Bzzzzzz. See that fellow there who claims he's

46 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

your follower. He's an old murderer. Don't trust
him I

- Hello! I gotta question to ask you. Do people
bother you asking questions alia time? I been here
three years. A bum rap, I told the board, listen, a
guy in 347 killed four people and they give him a
three months date, I bin here five years, they shot
me down two years. HE KILL FOUR PEOPLE I
What kinda justice is that?

- Hello! Lemme ask you a question. Doan trust
anyone. If you gotta do time, this is the best place.
Don't trust anyone. I tell you what to do. I give you
one piece of advice. Don't hsten to these mother-
fuckers. They keep an eye on you. Everything you
do. They gotta give me a date this time. All they
can keep here is your body. You'll hke it here, it's
the best place to do time.

I slide legs down the cool sheets, lay my head
on the pillow, and slide directly into sleep.

Report to custody. The Captain wants to see you.

Captain Koffman is a brisk no-nonsense correc-
tion veteran. He quelled Quentin. He mastered
dread Soledad. He ran the slave caravans from
Folsom down to Tehachapi. He manned the gun
towers of Chino. He fired gas guns at weeping
prisoners. A tough, clipped gray-haired jaunty com-
mander.

- I won't waste words with you. We took a big
risk in accepting you here. This is minimum secu-
rity. If you have to do time this is the best joint in
country. But minimum security means minimum
trouble. Any bullshit from a troublemaker and I'll
have his ass on the bus for Folsom in twenty-four
hours. If you act like a horse's ass here, we'll treat

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 47

you like a horse's ass. If you act like a scholar and
a gentleman, we'll treat you that way. We know
how to handle political cases. I was at Quentin
when Chessman was there. And we've got your
friend, Huey, the Negro agitator next door. You'll
be watched carefully. You can do hard time or easy
time. It's up to you. Starting tomorrow morning
you report to work in the custody office. We want
to keep an eye on you.

Sitting at a desk in the Custody Headquarters,
nerve center of the prison. Professional cons run
the joint with cynical efficiency. They control all
records. See all, hear all. I am freaking out holding
wet palms waiting for the phone to ring with
news of freedom. Take a walk, keep moving.

Standing by the fence looking down at the cars
on the highway I notice a prison maintenance truck
drive up. The driver, about thirty-five, dressed in
mechanic's clothes. He motioned me over.

- Bonne Chance, he said. His face and his voice
reflected a cool, humorous detachment. Almost
insolence. I picked up heroin vibes.

- Who are you? I asked.

- I'm called Brian Barritt. You should call me
Whisper. I work here. It's an interesting job. I'd
like to tell you about it.

Another friendly social worker type, I thought.
He'll probably confess that he thinks marijuana
should be legal. Barritt was leaning out of the
truck window looking at me quizzically.

- Dealing current. That's my specialty. If you
need any juice, just ask me. Wattage, voltage,
amps, generators, transformers, resisters, ampli-
fiers. I know the circuits and the wiring. Listen,

48 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

would you give me a hand for a moment. It will
give us a chance to talk.

He leaped out of the truck and gracefully moved
to the rear. He had a dancer's build, sUght. The skin
on his arms was smooth and covered with tattoos.
He unbolted the rear panel and handed me a coiled
wire, while he busied himself with the tool kit.

- How are you planning to get out of here, he
asked.

- Tm getting bailed out this week according to
the lawyers.

- No one gets bailed out of state prison. The
government can't let you out. It would be the ass
of any judge or politician. To get out of here you're
going to go over the fence. Inside dope man, do you
want some?

He spoke with assurance and a discernible laugh
in his voice.

~ What do you mean? I remembered all the
warnings.

- I see that you're confused by the nature of my
game. Look. I'm a dealer of enthusiasm. I've been
a dope pusher for fifteen years. I've done time my-
self. I work here now to bring a little freedom, to
help prisoners escape one way or another. For me
it's a buzz. I've got a key to the side gate. I'll loan
it to you. You just unlock the gate, run to the high-
way in ninety seconds; your wife picks you up and
you're free.

~ Why are you doing this?

- Oh, if you can give me some bread I'd take it.
But I'd do it for just the charge, the flash that your
escape would cause. Can you dig the flash?

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 49

Whisper glanced up.

- It's dangerous to be seen talking to you. Think
over what I said. You are suspicious. That's wise,
rd Hke to leave something with you to read. It's
some script I wrote about prison. Maybe you'll
accept it.

He handed me a sheet of white paper, leaped
into the cab, smiled, started the engine, and drove
off. I walked to the office and read his "Whisper"
script.

THE EARTH HAS ORBITED HALFW^AY ROUND THE
SUN SINCE I WAS FIRST ARRESTED AND MY CHEM-
ISTRY IS WORKING AT SPEEDS CONDITIONED BY
BEING LOCKED ALONE IN A CELL FOR OVER SIX
MONTHS. DEPRIVED OF EXTERNAL STIMULI, THE
PRISONER TURNS HIS SENSES INWARD AND LIVES
OFF MEMORIES INTERLACED WITH LUST. HIS MEDI-
TATIONS, PROGRAMMED BY THE PROBABILITY THAT
SOMETHING IS WRONG AT HOME, ROOT IN CON-
TAMINATED SOIL AND GROW MONSTER DEFORMI-
TIES INVOLVING HIS MOST VULNERABLE ATTACH-
MENTS. THE MORE HE BROODS THE STRONGER HIS
DELUSIONS GROW UNTIL IT BECOMES A RACE TO
SEE WHICH IS RELEASED FIRST, BUT WHICHEVER
WAY, HIS PARANOIAS BECOME HARD FACTS.

SHE JOKED WITH HER LOVER ABOUT YOU WANK-
ING OVER HER PICTURE; A PALE STRANGER OFFERS
SM ARTIES TO YOUR CHILDREN; WATERY EYES AND
LONG THIN FINGERS TITILLATE THE SACRED
SHRINE. THINK ABOUT IT, YOUR BEST FRIEND
SATISFYING YOUR WIFE. FEEL IT, ITCHING INSIDE
YOUR THIGHS. THAT MELTING DEEP DOWN INSIDE?
THAT'S THE PRISON SEX KINK. WITH A MAD LITTLE
GIGGLE A ONE-ARMED BANDIT PULLS HIS OWN
CONTINUUM AND WINKS AT HIS TORMENTORS.

AND THE DEEPER HE DELVES INTO HIS ABOMINA-
TIONS THE STRONGER HIS SEXUAL URGE BECOMES.

50 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

THE WORST THINGS HE CAN THINK OF ARE THE
EASIEST TO CONJURE AND ARE NOT ONLY POS-
SIBLE, PROBABLE, BUT HAPPENING RIGHT NOW.

I read the script once, read it twice, and the
third time caught the formula and said aloud,
- He's a fucking genius.

The chief clerk filing cards on a wheel across
the room looked up.

- Who's a fucking what?

— The electrical man is a fucking genius, I said.
At 10 : GO P.M. a steam whistle summons us back

to bunk count.

At 10:30 the whistle flicks lights off. The sixty-
man sleepship slowly settles, bedsprings squeak-
ing. Coughing barks ripple the quiet sea. Here and
there a flare of match lights a cigarette. A tired,
shuffling parade of men back and forth to the
shitter. Slowly, the trampship sinks in night sea.
The bullfrog chorus restlessly snores. A few last
lung-wrench coughs clear the decks for night
thoughts.

Weaving plans to climb the fence. Pickup cars.
Wild police chase. Hideouts. Roadblocks. Now the
guard comes, flashlight dancing overhead, jerking
his head, right, left, lips silently counting. Next
come the creeping lovers. Tiptoeing down to hobby-
room rendezvous. Usually au pair. Sometimes a
third man stands in the hall as point lookout. The
air is redolent of furtive sex. Alarm clocks.

In the bunk next to the toilets the sleepless chief
snitch listens to his earphones, watching, watching
whom who's fucking. There are no secrets in
prison.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 51

I am making a dream movie without a script.
If s a recurrent megalomaniac habit. The Carnival
at Rio was background this time. There was a
German producer with a four-man crew, an under-
ground magazine editor from Buenos Aires and
his girl,' a Swedish model. Five Brazilian friends
protecting me. And a Brazilian movie crew making
a movie of the German movie.

She was a jet-set love addict who hated drugs,
dancing with a sleek South American rhythm.
She was always there. I'll love for two she said.
When the long conferences got boring, she'd play
a Bossa Nova record very loud and dance. We
spoke French and Spanish and never got hung up
in head games.

I was accelerated, uplevehng each structure
as fast as it formed. (People often get disturbed
by this. ) The Brazilian director dug the movement
and kept flashing smiles. The German director was
magnificent under the circumstances. He had been
sent over to get a serious talk-interview. He kept
agreeing to let the action tell the tale. Vapor trail
design is a valid art form.

We spent every night whirling through carnival
streets in masks. She moved with us. The first two
nights she'd murmur around three o'clock and we
would return to the hotel. She would toss her black
hair back and forth on the piUow and murmur,
si, si, oui, oui, si, plus, encore plus, 6 cherie, f ais-
moi Tamour.

52 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

The last night of Carnival she said she'd wait
for me. I stayed out until sunrise and the last
drumbeat.

Then I missed her and raced back to the hotel.

I was relieved to find her sleeping in our bed.
Her bare arms embraced the pillow. Lying on her
stomach was a book. The Anatomy of Man, a
medical book in German. With diagrams. She was
far out.

I began to whisper lovingly. I turned out the
light and touched her. She moved away. To make
room for me? I smelled of debauch. She stirred. I
pulled off the fooFs costume. Drunken husband
fucks sleeping wife. She turned into an Indian
girl, submissive, raped by the European conqueror,
going through the motions.

She sat up in bed. Her eyes kept straying to the
door, to the window. She rattled in fast Spanish
that she had called Albert in Sao Paulo and he
had forgiven her for being away from work. She
began reproaching me gently for my stupidity.

She lay back on the pillow. Her eyes kept mov-
ing to the bedtable. She reached over for a small
tube and unscrewed the top. She delicately in-
serted the plastic phallus in her left nostril and
inhaled luxuriously drifting off in reverie. I called
to her. She reluctantly opened her eyes and moved
the tube to the right nostril.

- Qu'est-ce que c'est?

- C'est bon. II me fait sentir si bonne. Tu veux
unpen?

The tube had a hole in the end. I put it in my
nose. The odor was medicinal, sweet familiar. It

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 53

put my head into a soft warm infant place. Breath-
ing gently I could hear gas flowing from the tube.
It was the ultimate narcosis. I started to drift into
gaseous bliss. It didn't matter if I ever got back.
Just before I blanked out some survival reflex
screamed a warning. I moralistically pulled the
tube out of my nose and screwed back the top.

She was lying back smiling. - Es bueno, eh?
Paradise, eh ch^ri?

She reached for the tube and moved erotically.
Then she inhaled.

- What is it? I asked prudishly.

She opened her eyes. - C'est centre le froid.
Parf ait, non?

She clutched in her hand a small tube that took
you to instant heaven. If the world becomes dull,
unpleasant, she can just take a sniff and float. I
examined the tube with disapproval. The end was
white. The body green with red lines. Large white
letters speUed VICKS INHALER. The smaU-print
instructions were in German.

Her eyes followed as I put the tube on the far
edge of the bedside table. I told her that there was
another alternative to anesthesia. She frowned
and said : - Dis-moi, quoi. Quelle est la meiUeure
alternative. Her eyes kept moving to the table.

- Love, I said. She listened with interest.

54 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

WESTERN UNION TELEGRAPH FORM
CALIFORNIA MEN'S COLONY WEST
SAN LUIS OBISPO, CALIF.

SUPREME COURT JUSTICE DOUGLAS COPPED OUT.
YOUR BAIL DENIED. TERRIBLY SORRY. SEE YOU
THIS WEEKEND. PEACE AND LOVE.

ATTORNEY-AT-LAW

Ifs election year after all. And so ended my
contract with the Constitution of the United States.
Justice Douglas freed me. Fm now forced to go
outlaw, underground, exile. This little experiment
is getting complicated. Professor.

The count-clear whistle pulls me from my bunk.
I shove the manuscript Whisper gave me under
the mattress. It is a warm May night. I smoke a
cigarette watching Spica in Virgo. I need an inside
guide. I walk to the north cellblock to Burroughs's
cell. Two beds, two lockers — trim, tidy, military.
He is precisely rolling cigarettes, one-third Bugler,
one-third Top, one-sixth mentholated Kite, dash of
Prince Albert, pinch of 602.

- That's the best tailor-made custom-built Rolls
Royce of a motherfucking cigarette in the world.
So the Supreme Court shot you down, huh?

- No, thaf s just the first round.

- Better keep singing that loud 'cause They
watch us carefully here. Anytime a prisoner get
bad news they put him on hot file to watch him
close in case he kill himself or escape or get in

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 55

fights. Sometimes they transfer a cat out of here
to maximum security if he gets bad news like that.

- What do I do now?

- I expected this. No one bails out of here, man.
YouVe got to con your way out. Just takes time
and youVe got plenty of that. Hibernate man.
Sleep through the bad times. Ain't no animal
taught you that yet? Weave a soft heroin cocoon
around you.

He's a fussy, junkie alchemist, briskly rolling
cigarettes, adjusting his false teeth, carefully tuck-
ing in his blue shirt preparatory to an evening
stroll.

- Dig man. I waited three years here working
as a patient slave until the coffee-runner job
opened up. You gotta tailor your reactions perfectly
to theirs. After a while you know just how they
think. It's not hard. Two years after I got the job
- ShazamI I got my date. Quick and easy. I just
push my coffee cart into every one of their office
minds. Assistant Superintendent, Captain, every
counselor in Building 310. Even the parole board.
They're always hung over in the morning and their
glazed eyes light up when they see me. You can
have my job when I leave.

- What about just going over the fence?

He looked over my shoulder in warning. He
jerked head toward door. - Let's take a walk.

Out into the yard, a brisk evening stroll. We
are always alert to approaching cons or guards.
Keep voice soft, eyes moving.

- You shouldn't have said that about escape.

- I was joking.

- No matter man. This place is crawling with

56 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

snitches. The walls are paper, man. Anyone hear
you mention escape you be transferred to Folsom
in a second. This is a good prison. Dig the grass
and the flowers and the blue sky. And all the dope
you need. Freedom to move around this way after
evening chow. This prison is paradise. In Folsom
you don't relate to sun for weeks at a time. Escape's
a desperate fix. Look at that gun truck.

At each corner of the compound from six eve-
ning until six morning park the gun trucks. Armed
guards watching five hundred feet of roadway
leading up to fence.

- Those gun-truck guards are killers. They
always put the meanest bulls out to the gun trucks.
Those mothers stir up trouble with cons so they
sit out here all night with their fingers on the
trigger. There's no way of getting over that fence
without your being seen. By time you at the road,
there's an alarm that puts a hundred squad cars
on the highway looking for you, Dad. At night
the fence is lit up every six foot. During day, they
deal snitches to watch each section of fence. Check
it out tomorrow. You see those cats sitting with
transistor radios just watching the fence. They
see someone go over, in thirty seconds they're on
the phone screaming to Control.

- Why do they do it?

- That's their trip for getting out. Bootlicking.
They get httle favors. Canteen ducats. Most of
these cats here have no family or friends outside
that give a fuck for them. To hustle that five or
ten dollars a month for cigarettes they do the
snitch trick. There's another thing. In the custody
building there's this Escape Room. I been there.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 57

Dig. They gotta map of California and the
western states, with a series of rings centering
on San Luis Obispo. When the escape whistle
blows automatic plans go into action. They gotta
phone hookup to local, county, and state police
and FBI. They estimate the time of arrival of the
escapee at different distances from here. Sheet
man, it's simple. They just call out roadblocks.
At plus ten minutes they seal off all roads within
a fifteen-mile radius. At plus thirty minutes they
start blocking state highways. This prison is stra-
tegically located. It's out here in nowhere halfway
between L.A. and Frisco. Just two highways north
and south. Escape is the million-to-one shot. Use
your time here to learn what you don't know. Stick
a needle in your arm. It do some good, it do no
harm. Heroin is the best way to escape. Want
some?

I wanted to be with Her heavenly body, so I
thought of the electrician's offer instead. For the
past few days I had looked, but his truck was no-
where to be found. I asked Burroughs about him.

- Barritt? He laughed. How did you get hooked
up with him? You don't waste time, do you? He's
the connection. Barritt is OK. You can trust him.
He's a turned-on cat. But don't be seen hanging
out with him. That would get you both in trouble.

Prison leads to thoughts of violence. Should I
use force to escape death?

Huey Newton's presence in the next prison
courtyard was tangible. Is self-defense against,
the lethal machine an act of violence? Millbrookj
was lovely. I went with Jobie and Gabriel and June. }
Two thousand years of Christian dogma? Pohtics
keeps Christ on the cross? Hummingbirds spin
by ripping off insects. At Lunacy Hill we dug up)
sassafras roots. Cycles of eating and being eaten.

Spanish conquistadores and Norman crusaders
and Southern Baptists. On Ecstasy Hill I loved you7>
Didn't go to the Meditation House but drove pasjj
happy to see Tibetan paintings. Should we resist?
I miss you so beloved. If a Black defends against
the slave master is he violent? I wish I could]
sleep until your return.

The time is growing very long. Passive sub-/
mission to slavery? Personal suicide? Racial geno-
cide? Socrates in the hemlocked death cell? Would
I kill to be free?

I found a magazine under my pillow. A white
sheet was folded inside. Another ^Whisper" script
from Barritt. My bunk-neighbor bank-robber mur-

60 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

derer, kidnapper of state police kindly bespectacled
potbellied Digest reader watching me.

- Did you notice who put this magazine under
my pillow?

- No. Maybe a guard.

- A guard?

- I seen a screw other day putting something
or taking something away from your pillow. Be
careful. They watch you.

Is this an elaborate trap? Like the Berrigans?
Or maybe Uncle Sam wants me to escape. Shoot
me fleeing? Or let me go, good riddance? I lay
on the bimk and opened the magazine.

INHERE

IS A LITTLE HELL

AFTER MY OWN HEART

NOT TOO CRUEL

WITH A FEW NICE DAMNED TO FOIST MY GROANS ON

IT IS IN THE TRANQUILLITY OF DECOMPOSITION

THAT I REMEMBER THE LONG CONFUSED EMOTION

WHICH WAS MY LIFE

AND THAT IT JUDGE IT

AS IT IS SAID THAT GOD WILL JUDGE ME

AND WITH NO LESS IMPERTINENCE

The Thirty-fourth Degree Mason, advanced
adept of Rosicrucians, savant of Egyptian lore,
White Knight of the Mystic Temple of Oriental Oc-
cultism waved his plump hand. He was dressed all
in purrs from his bald to his heel and his face it was
twinkhng with wheel and with deal. When what
to my wondering ears should declaim but a copy
of Gurdjieff , a bag full of names. On Krishna. On
Bailey. On Manson and Crowley. So crumpled his

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 61

togas, SO shallow his yogas, this merry old bawd,
I laughed when I saw him in spite of his fraud.

- Let's take a walk, he said.

We strolled down the prison halls him holding
my arm spinning pink clouds of cotton platitudes.
He was doing a long term for real-estate fraud.
MiHions, my dear. Two Rolls-Royces in the garage.
Would you believe it?

- I shut you up last night when you talked
about helping me escape from here. Take it easy
man. Fm getting out on bail and I don't want to
get transferred to Folsom.

Shrewd glance.

- Sure you're getting out on bail. We all are.
But don't worry about my escape plan. It's not
criminal. It's occult. Powers of consciousness.
Leave the physical plane entirely. What are we
doing down here in these ugly bodies anway? We
beautiful souls.

I'm a sleek leopard padding by his side.

- What's the plan?

- Simple. Focusing of consciousness. There are
ten men here who meet regularly in Mr. Bray's
theosophical course. Some night, when the astro-
logical situation is perfect (I'll write away for a
reading) we form a circle with you in the middle,
and we center cosmic consciousness and with us
as your launching pad you ascend into the astral
plane. From whence Blessed One, you will in your
mercy and compassion send down aid to us.

I laughed at the thought of ten middle-aged men
in prison garb under a full moon chanting me over
the fence.

62 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

At noontime the call came: YOU HAVE A
VISITOR. Slickly cleaned and dressed I walk down
to the mail room. Yes, ^[ourwife is here now with
special dispensation. You can see her today, but
she must obtain authorization for future visits.
Now stand there arms up, check no wristwatch,
pat arms, pat shoulder, pat down sides, two swift
motions up crotch down pants legs. Your wife can
purchase items from machines. Inmates are not
allowed to touch money. You can receive five packs
of cigarettes, five candy bars or peanuts. You may
kiss or embrace upon meeting and upon departure.
No lascivious touch or caress. OK. You may go in
visiting room now.

Swinging doors into third-class salon of a Polish
ocean liner. Prim-grim rows of wicker chairs and
sofas chastely confronting wooden tables. Wall
paintings. Inspirational prayers from Alcoholics
Anonymous leading down to a cluster of coin-
operated dispensing machines and the purser's
counter. Your wife^ is on her way over from the
waiting room. From the window I watch the grace-
ful dark-haired beauty, walking across the ramp
through open doors into our arms at long last.

We kissed, for the first time in eight weeks.
Then the Pavlovian ritual. Dropping quarters in
robot slots, pushing levers hke well- trained labora-
tory animals rewarded with cigs and candy.

— How was New York?

r^ - We lost three thousand dollars in the Bail
Benefit. That fence isn't electrified, is it?
, - No. And I got a key. I'm ready to leave as
/ soon as you . . . I'm whispering in her ear.
/ I've already talked about that with Irene in New

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 63

York. She says she knows how to do it. She's mak-
ing inquiries now about other countries. She says
she needs four weeks and ten thousand dollars.

- Which we don't have.

- It's a simple trick to get the money She said.
Too soon the lights flick signal for leaving.
The guards watch carefully as we kiss.

Back to my cellblock. I sit on the stoop facing
the western sun burning scarlet holes in my optic
tapestries. Listening lazily to the lapping hquid of
endocrine tides. The section runner taps my
shoulder.

Custody wants you on the phone.

I walked to the section office and picked up the
phone. Soft persistent whisper.

- Can anyone hear you talking?

- No. The runner's in the hall.

- Your wife was here today.

- How do you know?

- Did you tell her that I'll help you escape?

- She said it sounded crazy. Who are you and
why?

- Tell her that I am an addict of experience —
good or bad, with a bias for intensity. She doesn't
trust me. She's right. You shouldn't either. That's
why I'm sending you the scripts. Are they worth
your freedom. If you want to use them to get out
of here have yourjvife line up a getaway car and
a fake passport. I'll keep sending you notes. I'm
trying to get over to your side of the prison so we
can talk in person.

- What about you? What do you get in ex-
change?

- All I want is a buzz.

64 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

A wheeler-dealer con approaches, his face
solemn with conspiracy. He is the mail-room
trustee and a prison politician. We walk out the
cellblock to the ramp.

- Listen, you get a lot of letters here that you
never get to see. Did you know that?

I nodded. He is a twenty-year top whose main
hope for freedom is to snitch somebody off. The
administration here reads your letters. Every day
we send your mail to the warden and they get kicks
from the letters you get. He handed me an en-
velope from his pocket.

- Here's a letter you might want to read. Be
sure and destroy it. I could get in trouble.

I looked at the blue envelope. Without knowing
why, I suddenly thought of fucking. The snitch
was wiggling his nose.

- Funny smell. Does it come from that enve-
lope?

I could smell it too.

- It smells like cunt to me.
The snitch laughed.

- You been locked up too long.

Back at my bunk I put the envelope to my nose.
No doubt about it.

Dear Prisoner:

I am writing this letter in hopes of connecting
with you. I always wanted to meet you and then
I heard that you were in prison. Can I write you?
Can you write me?

My life goes like this. I am living alone in a

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 65

small stone house in Italy. I am free of children,
husbands, lovers, jobs, parents, America. It's
hard to be alone. I want people. Am learning that
there is no right or wrong. Think I should dig
the aloneness, even when I don't. Now I think
I'm cool.

Sometimes I can't beheve how stupid I am. I
smell like cunt all the time. (Do the prison
authorities read these letters? I hope not.) Well,
anyway my desires cannot reflect unfavorably
on you. This is an unsolicited letter from a lust-
ful groupie. Do I smell like cunt more than most
women? My own smell drives me mad with
wanting. Does that make you feel good to lie
in prison and think of me lying in the sun
naked in southern Italy dripping wet thinking
of fucking you?

So here I am lying in the courtyard of my
stone house, with a thin layer of sweat covering
me; thighs sticking together and opening to the
cool breeze; a shght salty smell coming off my
armpits. I rest relaxed and warm, thinking las-
civious thoughts of your tongue curling into my
mouth and cunt and here I am alone penetrated
by sun and wind, nearly satisfied, letting my
mind take my body through pleasures. It isn't
a bad way to spend a day.

When I get very intense rapping to people
they seem to understand the concepts I am into.
My desire is so great to talk it out, be understood.
It fucks me, this hunger. No orgasm. I'm always
out there somehow, very intent and intense and
dangling. It's no good for my body. It's lonely.
I don't want to be alone. I want to be with some-
one on the trip. I wish I were in your cell with
you. Maximum security.

66 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

You might not want to be bothered reading
this.

Mary Jane

The call from Whisper came at lunch break.

- I keep rereading your notes. It's as good as
anything Beckett has written.

- You make me want to write more, jfour wif e?

- ^She's still hnin^ up a car and ID.

- Tell her not to delay. Every day adds to the
chance that you might be transferred. I've been
thinking a lot about it. You are as good as free.

Cheers from TV room. Shouting joy. Huey New-
ton is going to be free! The Supreme Court re-
versed his case. They're freeing Huey. Hell get bail
in two months.

Many souls are happy tonight. The prison air is
clearer.

I shave and shower, waiting for her visit. A shy
starched embrace. Smoking cigarettes, drinking
^coffee ,jffl:£^plot the flight. Connie and Blyde.

- Well the dealing brothers won't be able to
break you out. They're scattered. Mexico. Hawaii.
Pakistan. Boats from Lebanon. On' the run. And
John Griggs is gone. He would have loved to drive
the geta;way carl Now let me teU you about Aries.
I'd seen him several times at the Berkeley house.
Hanging out. When he asked to speak to me in
private I thought he meant to offer us money for

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 67

the appeal. We went to the edge of the sun deck.
I didn't think we'd be talking about anything too
illegal so I didn't suggest walking to the park where
I usually go to get away from bugs and taps.

- I deal acid to a group of tumed-on revolution-
aries who want to free Timothy.

- Great, I said. We could use money for the
lawyers. Maybe they could put some energy be-
hind the Jimi Hendrix benej&t.

- Oh, no, he said. They want to bust him out
and help get the two of you out of the country. Or
go underground.

- Let's walk in the park, I said.

So we sat under a tree in the botanical garden
smoking grass, my paranoia button depressed.
- Who are you, Aries?

- I'm a chemist. Graduate school dropout. I've
been making DNT, MDA, and I perfected a for-
mula for acid.

- You make your own?

- Small quantities. I give it away to people I
know who will use it righteously.

- Who is this group that wants to do it?
I must have looked dubious.

- You want a reference?

- I nodded.

- Call Pat. Check me put with her. I'll be by
tomorrow to follow up on it.

- When I got back to the house I phoned Pat
and told her I had to see her at once. She seemed
to know what was happening and told me Aries
was OK. We'll know next week.

68 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

Black brothers lounging around stoops in sun
laughing rapping wave power fists. Burroughs gets
up and joins me.

- Saw you on the visiting lawn. Whew 1

- How'dllook?

- The bulls were watching you. Be careful.
Don't look so high.

- How?

I walk the yard alone thinking about escape.
I need inside help from a stir-wise con who knows
this terrain. Details about patrol cars and fences
and timing and traps. Is Whisper a setup? Could
this dull-minded system invent an ambush with
mystery and elegant prose? Could that poetry be
faked?

Today another anonymous letter from Italy.

Dear Captive One ...

With a joint in my left hand and this pen in
my right, I write you a letter. It doesn't have to
be to that group of molecules forming flesh
structure, brain structure called you. It could be
any goddamn human form on this earth. Am I
too much to handle? I am so full of myself and
life that I have to hold another conversation of
flesh and neuron to expand. Fm lonely and sad
because it's so stupidly alone in this world.
Everyone is so fucking scared.

Whiz baby, it's so fucking hot here it's like a
jungle. The vegetation is up to my waist. Out-
side the bedroom window are millions of red
poppies. Sitting naked, covered with oil. I wiU
write awhile in here and then go back to the
sun. A Dutch boy walked up to my cottage

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 69

yesterday. Without a word we took off our clothes
and sat in a golden Yab Yum. Not a word was
said. We sat for a while looking into eyes and
then I moved onto his lap and he lifted me up
to some cloud floating I swear to you that we
levitated. Whew! Can you dig how that blew my
mind? I figured I knew about sexual energy . . .
men, women, boys, tender, mean, love, lust,
belly hanging over lacy bikini pants and silky
shirts . . . beautiful people climbing in-and-out-
of-bed, making love, pissing, eating, singing,
maybe coming. Oh yeah, I saw it all from the
beginning and in the beginning, I ate the apple
(orgasms a bonus with a ten-shekel purchase
or more) and then, whiz baby, sat on his lap and
got whirled up to some new fantastic place.
Whew! Explain it! I was left so confused. He
was so cool and matter-of-fact. How often does "
this happen?

Do you mind my asking these questions now?
After all, we've never met.

Galaxies of new energies centered on my cunt
and suddenly I became his cock and he was hold-
ing me like a tree growing out of his pelvis. What
are we going to do with me now?

Mary Jane

Every day I wander the compound looking for
Whisper's truck. He spends most of his time on the
east side. He has become a magnetized center for
my hopes.

Looking out the window of the custody office
I see his wagon flash by. I run down the stairs

70 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

across the lawn and down the road to the tobacco
factory. Cons glance at me curiously. I slow down
and look casual. My heart is pounding.

- No letter from Aries?
He smiled tenderly.

- You're wired up, aren't you. Maybe I should
give you some heroin to turn off your red-alarm
system. No, Fve been checking the post office every
morning. I guess Aries is scared.

- You look a little worried yourself, I said.

- Fve been seen talking to you. Maybe reported.
I gotta be careful. There's another problem. I can't
unlock the gate for you. No matter. That plan was
too risky. There are other ways out of here.

- How?

- Just climb the fence. I'll tell you when and
where.

Climb the fence is a scary idea. It sounded so
easy just to stroll out.

- There's the right time and the right place to
do it. I'm not going to tell you now. You'd end up
staring at the fence and get snitched off. There's
another way too. I'll check it out.

- But in any case I have to do it myself?

- Yeah. You're going to have to be in the best
physical shape of your life. Do you push iron?

- Not much. Handball and yoga.

- Not good enough. Start tomorrow and spend
an hour each day building up your arms and
shoulders. You gotta run like a deer and climb
like a monkey. See you.

Burroughs drops by my bunk and hands me a
magazine.

- Run these through your video. Porny shots in
color of the Frisson queens. Oh yes, I remember
you, Mother Opium, Womb Queen. Pink golden
boobs ripening, hquid smile, legs inviting.
Sprawled, soft papaya cunt tasseled slender finger
opening smooth hps. Oh, do come chmb inside
my soft cocoon, she murmurs.

And Mistress Alcoholia, the Stupor Queen, wan-
ton bending forward saucy face turned over Her
shoulder. Oh please fuck me rearly. Her round
buttocks wiggling, velvet slit whispering, oh now,
oh now, honey, you're going to honey fuck my
honey ass. Cha cha cha.

And Princess Cocaine, the Go-Go Queen, danc-
ing naked on the shiny crystal tabletop. Her plat-
inum hair swinging, her high heels clacking. Do
it to me! Oh do it! Do it to me. Do iti Do it! Do it!

And Mademoiselle Aphrodisia, * the Orgasm
Queen, her big saucer black eyes smiling, mini-
skirt pulled up, black stockings, cream thighs
curled black cunt hair spread open murmuring
pussy mouth pouting, come, kiss me, come kiss me,
make me come, come, come.

Burroughs is grinning. The nervous system feels

72 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

no pain. With the right dope and good pictures in
your head you don't need nothing more. Want
some heroin?

The mail desk brings another letter from Italy.

Poor Enslaved One . . .

What a cruelty to lie in the sun alone. Do you
get horny when you feel the sun hcking your skin
and moisture forms? And you with all those
men! I could dig it. I imagine your body firm and
brown and virginal now. Do you have secret
occult ways of dealing with sexual energy in
prison? I hope the terrible hassles you've been
through haven't marked your face with sorrow
wrinkles and bitter lines.

I have just eaten artichoke with ai'oli, that's
Midi mayonnaise with garlic, rice; tamari sauce,
concoction of honey and apple pancake, finishing
off with coffee and a cigarette. Was propositioned
by Juho, a neighbor peasant. He's the only local
I'd fuck but I won't fuck him either. He came
over the other night to tell me there was no
vineyard work on Tuesday and he'd hke to make
love. I tried to tell him it wouldn't work. He
hstened happily while I expended energy explain-
ing and then he grabbed me and kissed me hard.
I had to fight loose, angry because he was being
so heavy. All ended friendly. I wish you were
working in the garden with me. So cool going
down the rows with you in the hot sun, talking
or not.

What did you think of my meeting with the
Dutch boy. Afterward we walked and drank wine
and climbed into bed. It was all so routine. He
just moved on top of me and in with one motion.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 73

Again, no word was said, and Fm the most
verbal person alive. It was so fucking domestic.
He moved slowly like some craftsman to that
place of fear in me and past it. Crushing my
breasts, my legs, clinging to his back, my body
hanging onto his body past the pain place and
my body told him fuck as hard as he wanted. I
remember getting scared and crying. My strong
mind and egocentric will gone, man. I wept to
be enslaved, juice oiling our legs. He was like
some relentless pressure searching every comer
of my cunt and I knew he would never stop.
Wine on his breath. He was worried about the
noises I made. We sHd into sleep.

Is this interesting? How strange to think of
you reading this in your prison ceU.

His body was so delicious stretched the length
of me. Later I curled into his back, wanting him
some more but timid; waiting for him to move
first but I couldn't keep my hands from moving
along his chest and belly and down to his cock.
Then he asked so shyly in Dutch can I fuck you
in my cunt he was soothing and caressing.
Orgasms seems old-fashioned and histrionic, a
lower level of consciousness. You know he never
came in all the times we connected. I thought a
lot about that.

In the morning without a word he told me that
it was time to leave.

, Mary Jane

Burroughs is high, lecturing me on pimps and
whores :

- Fm working three girls on the main line in
Frisco see that arm (thin-chicken limb extended)
I put seventy-five thousand dollars pure coke in

74 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

that vein in one year on the bus from Memphis
she was about fifteen I said well baby youVe met
just the manll show you around the big city. I had
two at that time, Ethel and Peaches working
houses along Pine Street when she'd go to the
bathroom she'd shout **Whistle Chinatown Daddy^
he was my best friend but when he got back in town
and found out I'd turned out both of his sisters.
I was riding the main line on the hairy oyster you
know so I couldn't hear her tinkle turning tricks up
and down the coast with fifty thousand workmen
on the Alaska highway girls and dope said he'd
shoot me on sight the golden clam man the oval
cash register shot up twenty-five bills in a month
she'd come home at three in the morning and
throw the bread on the bureau every cent of it man
she made me fifty thousand and I never had to
spend a cent on her found this sixteen-year-old
Eurasian and threw her out only two kinds of men
in the world tricks and junkies not like the good
old days only two kinds of women in the world
hustlers and madams only two kinds of men in the
world Johns and pimps. The sexiest chicks love
skinny junkies cause we fix them the ultimate
fuck in the main line.

I am standing by the handball court keeping
tally, pushing the score peg down the number
slots, waiting to play the winner. The sun is hot
and my brown Mexican skin gleams with sweat.
I am in the best physical condition. In the corner
of my optical screen moves a flash of brown.
Whisper is standing by the corner of the cellblock.
When he catches my eye he disappears.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 75

- Manuel, take tally will you? Til be back in
five minutes.

He was bent over examining an electrical box.
A letter was on the ground beside him. I sat down,
ripped it and read quickly.

- What does Aries's letter say?

- His group will spring me for twenty-five
thousand dollars. They are up in the desert now
getting the overview and planning the caper. They
want to know if it's all right to carry guns. To use
if necessary. His people are on the run too and
don't want to get captured helplessly.

- That's irrelevant, said Barritt. Do you agree?

- I'll run it through my head, I said. There's
another problem though. Aries doesn't like the idea
of you being involved. He thinks it's a setup.

- I can dig it.

- He doesn't see any reason why we need you.
He says, string you along, get all the information
from you. Tell you that I'm going to wait for the
appeal. Then, when the time comes, hit the fence.

He smiled.

- I think the same way. I don't think we need
Aries and his big operation. It's bad security to
have a large bunch of freaks in on the plan. Some-
one is bound to talk. I think that I should drive
the pickup car. You'U save your twenty-five thou-
sand. All I'd need is bread for the« car and for a
fake ID for myself in case I have to split.

- If only Aries could meet you.

- No, that's out. That's not good for him or me.

- Well, if he could only read your "Whisper"
script he'd be convinced. Will you mail some of
your writing to him?

76 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

- No. That's too dangerous.

I wrote another note to Aries telling him to con-
tact league members to get the twenty-five thou-
sand. And telling him to trust me and my trust of
Whisper.

Standing starchy waiting Jler^ visit, ghe said
she'd hitchhike. For thirty minutes I lean out the
window watching. Mountain maiden, she comes

^in colors.

/ - I walked three miles down the mountain fog.

/ It's hard hitchhiking that early. Finally a middle-

! aged couple from Topeka took me as far as Hearst's
castle. There was another hiker in the back seat.
A white kid from Mississippi. James Dean type. I
started walking down the highway to get away
from him. Walking through the morning mists.
He followed saying things like If you weren't
married Yd ask you to hitchhike around the world
with me and What's marijuana really like? Finally
we were picked up by two long-hairs. They said,
Who are you visiting in San Luis? I said my
husband. They said, Oh your cousin! When the
sign came California Men's Colony West V2 Mile
I said let me off in half a mile. Getting out I said.
Do you want some grass? The kid driving said. Oh,
no, we've got enough gas. The other one said. Wait
a minute, did you say grass? They said. Give our
love to your cousin. Do you like my dress? It's
from Pakistan. The week is a long slow road to
Sunday.

- What news of the escape?

- Good news from Irene in the East. The po-

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 77

litical people approve. They'll get us out of the
country.

- Where?

- I don't know yet. Maybe Cuba. Or Algeria.
Or Chile. It all seems like a faraway dream to me.

Whisper asked: - What did^ygur^fe say?

- Aries is pressing for details. Like which night?
And what time? And how much time before they
know Tm gone?

- The best time is a foggy Saturday night.
Around 8:30. Most everyone is at the movie or
TV rooms. That gives you hour and half if you
aren't seen leaving.

- Suppose I'm seen?

- It will take ten minutes for the alarm to be
called in and for them to get cars out on the road.
It's a breathless chase that way but they can't stop
you getting to the road.

- You can be seen by the gun trucks. The key
plan is definitely out. They've chained all the side
gates and I don't have the new keys. You have to
go over the fence. Have you been working out with
iron like I told you? There's a secret way out of
here! I heard about it from an old Quentin veteran.
Every time he got shot down by the board he'd
tell his wife to meet him on the road next weekend.
She talked him into waiting five months for the
next board. He finally got a date and passed the
secret to me. Down by the visiting room a wire
cable crosses the road high above the fence. It's
above the lights so it can't be seen. You sneak
into the yard, go up the pole, grab the cable, and

78 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

pull yourself across. The cable is thick and strong.
About twenty feet high. Way above the fence.
The pole has metal foot spikes like that one.
My eyes walked up a nearby light pole.

- You mean I dangle hand over hand?

- No man. You wrap your legs around the cable
and shimmy across. You're wiry. Scamper across
like a monkey. The only problem is : Who will drive
you away? You should scratch Aries.

- He feels the same way about you.
He was silent for a minute.

- The heat is coming down. I'd rather not spend
the rest of my life in Folsom to get you free.

- Do you want to spht the country?

- More and more.

- OK. Let's work on that. You need a passport
and some money.

Lying on my bunk rereading Whisper's scripts.
This man has to be trusted. The whistle snuffs the
lights. I lie in bed measuring the panels on the ceil-
ing. The wire across the road is forty feet. Each
reach of hands is two feet. Twenty pulls. I count.
One pull, two pull. Three pull. Twenty seconds to
cross the wire like a rapid raccoon. Reach up for
the pole. Swing around. Shde down. Run free.

I spend the long night reviewing the plan. Run
to the road. Pick up a car. Drive fast to helicopter.
Fly south. Refuel at Joshua Tree in the desert. Fly
to Mexico. Rendezvous on highway near Hermo-
sillo. Drive to Veracruz. Rent a small boat to Cuba. I

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 79

sit up and fumble in my locker for the Bugler can
and roller. Dump in the tobacco. Lick the paper.
Roll it. I sit on bunk edge red tip glowing.

The continuous escape discussions with Whis-
per.

- I was drawn compulsively to the cable. I
located it. It runs over Building 324.

- Tm sorry you know. You've got to stay away
from there.

- You should meet Aries so hell know you can
be trusted. Or at least, as a start, Aries should
read your script. Won't you mail it?

- No. I don't put Aries down for distrusting me.
You're the one that's out of phase. Lives are at
stake. I don't want to meet him or to know his plan.
He feels the same. The scripts I write are for your
eyes only.

- Suppose I smuggle some of your script for
them to read.

- I gave the script to you.

How can I smuggle out some pages of Whisper's
manuscript. I start typing on thin onionskin paper
in top upper left corner. Single sp^ce. No para-
graphs. Telex escape message.

An unexpected visit. I shower quickly, and stick
the folded message in my shoe. An old friend has

80 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

dropped by to pay a call. I duck into the men's
room. Snatch off shoe and palm the missive. Re-
turning, I slide it into his coat pocket.

- This letter is of crucial importance. Will you
airmail it to Hertonight?

Shehitchhiked down on visiting day.

- There's a new development with Whisper.
He's under suspicion. He'll have to split when I do.
He gets blamed if I leave.

- Can't you just agree to avoid each other? Let
him go his way and we'll go ours. Aries is more
and more uptight about him. He says his work is
done. Pay him off and split. Aries is willing to
give him five thousand dollars. But he can't be told
when or where.

- But Whisper has risked himself. You and I
and Whisper are the known suspects. No one
knows that Aries is involved.

- And that's the way he wants to keep it. No-
body knows that he knows either you or me. The
money for Whisper is OK. I'll see if they'll go for
the ID.

At three in the afternoon she takes a taxi to the
San Luis Airport. Then a small plane to L.A. Then
a plane to San Francisco and a helicopter to
Berkeley. Then she hitchhikes home. She never
missed a visit, f aiffiTul woman.

Monday SLO time. I wake unrested. Powdered
coffee, powdered sugar, powdered cream, scald-
ing hot sink steam. Make bunk sweep floor. I
tenderly watch the wake-up rituals of thirty strange
deadfeUows. Old bald toad sits up in long Johns

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 81

solemnly stretching new white socks. Each morn-
ing at 7: 17 A.M. he rips the tons of two new socks.
He works in Clothing Distribution and has an un-
limited supply of factory-fresh socks. Old gray
mouse sitting in shorts on bunk unwrapping brown
bag stale sandwich. He works in the kitchen and
has unlimited supply of brown-paper sandwiches.
The Lovers, sitting on adjacent bunks smoking
together a quiet domestic breakfast cigarette. He
is a thin, white, cocky redhead. She is a tall,
shapely Black, who piles their lockers with floral
arrangements. Their love labored long to reach
the bUss of side-by-side twin beds. It took him two
months to get moved to the same dorm. For the
last five weeks we've watched the slow process of
their union. After five days he moved four beds
down. A trade for two cartons. Next week he
slipped five down and across the aisle to reach her
side. (She never moved. Just sat weaving flowers. )

Eight o'clock in the office. Coffee. News of
last night's events. The fights, ODs, busts, freak-
outs. I type a ducat list for twenty minutes. SLO
time. Five hours till mall call. Wander to the
library. Check back at office. Smuggle blue shirt
and pants into the laundry. My handball com-
padres sweating shirtless at the pressing tables.
Starch for Sunday Pepe? Four anc^ a half hours
till mail call. Six days till §be; comes. SLO time.
I sit at my office desk studying the sex life of
insects, working on Utopian blueprints, drawing
double helixes.

Eleven ten. SLO time. Early-line lunch for the
prison elite with special passes. Eleven thirty.
Outcount in the custody office. Thirteen blue

82 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

robots sitting on a hall bench while the bull counts
bodies pointing an inventory finger at each one
two three twelve thirteen nods pleased.

One o'clock in the afternoon. SLO time. Three
hours till mail call. Yoga on the lawn. Waiting for
Chicanes. Handball speeds time. At four o'clock
the section bull enters the cellblock holding letters.
MAIL CALL: Cluster roimd looking for the orange
envelope. Early line for dinner four fifteen. Read
the morning paper. Walk the grounds with Bur-
roughs. From ten till two tossing on the lumpy
mattress thinking. SLO time. Drift into a five-hour
restless sleep.
That's Monday.
That's Tuesday.
That's Wednesday.

That's Thursday. Slow time. Past halfway. The
week slides toward Sunday. SLO time.

One hundred and sixty-nine hours of SLO time
before She comes.

And Burroughs keeps telling me - Turn off,
man. You're keeping yourself uptight like a zoo
animal pacing the cage. Hibernate. Time-travel.
Sleep through this bad time in the cunt of Mother
Poppy. I know he is right, but I'm afraid of heroin.

ITie problem. Whisper is wrong. There are no
spikes to climb the pole to reach the cable. There
is a tree growing on the fence side of 356 from
which I could swing onto the roof. But how to
reach the tree? Jump out the corridor window?
Risky. And the room next to the tree must be
empty or the con lying in bed looks up and sees
me. Crawl under building to reach the tree?

I wander down to the west side just before the

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 83

8:00 count. The handball court Is deserted. I pre-
tend to be picking up handballs in a bucket. I
lean down, peer under building. It's a shaded
love nest. A convict on his knees dog-style his blue
jeans pulled down, white buttocks gleaming. He
is rocking slowly forward and back, his eyes closed,
his head turned to the side thoughtfully. Mounted
behind him a denim mastiff pumps slowly, his
head hidden behind the wooden floor beam. There
is not a soimd but the heavy breathing and shoes
shding for traction.

\

Beloved —

Kerosene lamp again. Firelight. Wonderful
wood, madrona, light-colored dry bums into soft
ash like manzanita only tree-sized. I've half a
cord and more promised. Use leaves as kindling
it ignites so easily. About ten now. The moon is
glowing on the sea. Jupiter is sitting behind the
mountains. A lonely lazy day yearning for you.
Frogs very vocal while sunbathing today. Tree
above me full of hummingbirds and humming
bees. Watch insects more closely now after your
stories. Dragonfiies landed near me observing
me curiously. Sent Susan $100. Joe will give
Jack $200. He sent you fifty. All from Richard
Alpert's check. Will write him from the house
here he was alleged to have inhabited.

Today's horoscope: Catch up on correspon-
dence to faraway friends. The star map is mean-
ingless without you. I miss you so my beloved.
Meditation house stillness sounds of energy. Fve
developed a nervous tic. Have to keep clearing
my ears by yawning, adjusting atmospheric pres-
sure. Tarquin says it's because I have a vertebra
out. I do have a stiff neck.

\

84 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

j Determined and bored. Oh dear. I've let the

j pregnant cat in. She wants to be between me

I and the letter. Washed the skyUght today. Ill

/ have to do another spate of work. Feehng guilty

/ about being lazy. I'll get on the phone organize

' arrange. Apply for welfare to get a driver's

hcense. Ease M. and J.'s passage. Raise bail

money. Bail money how glorious to have to think

about bail money. Oh my love perhaps in a

month. I feel so hopeful. I wish our telepathy

were perfected.

It's almost too bright to sleep outside. I've
arranged a sleeping place on the roof outside the
study in Berkeley. It's been too foggy to use it.
Ill be so happy when the house is empty and
quiet and I can work with the archivists. I yet
dream of making the study a serene and unclut-
tered place. My beloved I sit with you and watch
the sky. You shield the fiashHght with your hand
and look at the map and say it must be a space-
ship there's not supposed to be a star there. I
V^ love you. Come back soon.

Your Wife

The prisons are filled with heroin vibrations.
Junkies involved in the ancient cult devotion to
Mother Opium.

I came to prison with certain naive, liberal hypo-
critical prejudices against self-defense. Insulated
from the threat of violence, starvation, disease,
brute force, I was nonviolent, seeped in middle-
class serenity not shared by the majority of the
world population. Now I had to figure out what I
would do when armed violence threatened my life
and my freedom. The needle or the gun?

I entered prison with a fear of heroin. Logically

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 85

I knew that anyone had the right to put anything
in his body. But I maintained a moral superiority^
about junkies. Now I listen to the thoughtful
words of men who understand and truly love
heroin.

Burroughs says:

- I was making a heroin tantra with this singer,
the most elegant user I ever fixed, a heroin with a
mind like a looking glass, Lady H herself. We
were fixing each other with such gentleness and
love man (H in the arm and physeptone in the
ass). Identification becomes complete. I can no
longer separate the woman from the drug. All was
SHE, every cell in my body whispers Her name.
You just got to have respect for Lady H. Like any
other woman she's a goddess when loved but a
whore when abused. She's the Sphinx woman, the
foxy chick that turns you on so much that you
flip so crazy for her that you throw everything
away just to be with her.

Chicano, a handball partner, calls me aside.

- Don't tell anyone but I gotta transfer out of
here to forestry camp. I won't see you for a while.
I want to leave you a present. I tell you how to
escape from here.

- I'd rather not go out illegally.

- OK. But if you ever need to escape I tell you
two ways. The east gun truck goes off at midnight.
Also there's a cable wire over the west fence near
the visiting room. If you have to split the country
go to Tijuana. Hacienda Bar. Tell the bartender
there you know me. He'll get you papers and hide
you out. Bring some money though. Adios.

86 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

FOLLOWING NAMED MEN REPORT AT
ONCE TO CUSTODY: PRESTON, KELLY,
LEARY.

Walking back to Custody a dozen men call:

— Hey what they want you for?

Flanagan is serious in the Captain's office.

- There's been an escape. Some Mexican who
works outside in National Guard just jumped in a
jeep and drove off. Chicano. You know him. He
plays handball. Man I wish they'd clear me for
outside work. Just drive away in their machines.

- Why did they call us here?

- The photography office is printing 1,500
wanted cards. We have to stuff them in envelopes.

The Officer of the Day swaggers in:

- I hate to call you men out on Saturday night.
We got envelopes here addressed to every police
chief in western states. Have to stuff these wanted
flyers.

Wallet-size cards. Escape: Rogelio Chicano, age
33, Mexican, 5' 8", 157 lbs. Crime: rape, posses-
sion of narcotics. Wearing blue denim trousers and
shirt. If apprehended notify Superintendent Cali-
fornia Men's Colony West, San Luis Obispo, Cal-
ifornia. I pray for his safety.

- Don't worry about him said Flanagan. He's
got relatives just down the coast. He'll change his
clothes. Hell, by now he's cross the border to T.J.
That's his hometown. They'll never see him again
unless he's dumb enough to come back.

Flanagan will laugh when he stuffs my picture
in the brown envelope.

She^fioats on a lysergic cloud Her hair scented
wim&esmoke.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 87

- Was the money wired to Whisper?

- He's doing it today.

- If it comes tomorrow I can split in two weeks.

- There's been such confusion. Some of the
lawyers promise bail in two weeks, but the brief
hasn't even been filed. Two months have been lost.
It will be four months before bail. The lawyers
say wait. There's 80 percent chance you'll be out
legally by November 1 .

~ I'm going over the wall in two weeks.

- I agree. There's a big debate on whether guns
should be used if necessary. The lives of the
rescuers will be at stake. The pigs will be armed
and shooting to kill.

HE: - You don't have to flee with me. Ill split.
You stay here like Kathleen Cleaver. I'll
find an exile home. You come when you
are ready. Or you fly to Mexico with Ga-
briel. Be free.
SHE: - I have to go with you. They'd bust me the
the day after your escape.

HE: - You could prepare solid legal protection.
Disassociate yourself from my escape.
Maybe divorce me publicly.
SHE: - No. I couldn't do that.

HE: - OK. Then you go to New York this week
to ask Irene to get a secret apartment
there. Whisper will drive the car. We don't
need militant Aries.

88 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

Handball in the hot sun. I am learning the back
court. Fragile timing. Shoulder-arm whirls the ball
high away from forecourt. An ancient sweating,
healthy game. While waiting my turn I notice a
telephone repairman's canvas tent hung from
cable. Reassuring. It must be strong. Two repair-
men cons are stringing wire.

- What's that doing here?

- We're stringing telephone wire from the sup-
port cable.

- Is that cable really strong enough to hold a
repairman?

- You better believe it. It'll hold eight hundred
pounds.

- Hey Teem, you got next game tally?

- I need a partner. How about Pepe? Everyone
looks at the bench where Pepe lies motionless
sunning and they shake heads smiling.

- Pepe, he don't feel like playing today. I walk
by the bench. Pepe's face is relaxed. He's gone in
heroin dreams. He's a trembling stamen floating
in the petals while his body rests in a state prison.
The guard just walked past my bunk. Someone
begins sending me midnight telepathic recep-
tion tapes . . .

listen . . . tomorrow NIGHT YOU HELP ME

. . . you're the one I'm talking to ... I

LIFT HEAD LOOK AROUND BARRACKS . . . WHO'S
SENDING THE MESSAGE . . . TOMORROW AFTER-

confessions of a hope fiend 89

noon borrow a hoe from the landscape shack
. . . take it behind the tobacco factory and
break the handle about a foot from the
blade . . . hide it in your commissary bag
in your locker . . . when bull comes down
dorm at midnight after he passes your bunk
walk down to the shitter carrying the
blade . . . w^hen he returns step out in
hall and clobber him in head . . . one
slice split his skull like watermelon .
stuff his body in the laundry closet .
walk down to the next section office .
wait behind door until section bull ar-
rives . . . clobber him the same way .
in five minutes you have knocked out four
section offices . . . they're all dozing
. . . I'll do same on other side . . . with
those eight bulls out . . . the entire
prison is unguarded . . . except for con-
trol and custody . . . control is locked in
. . . leave it alone . . . custody is no prob-
blem . . . you move into watch lieuten-
ant's office and slice down sergeant . . .
i run upstairs flick start pa system on

baker's desk . . . TURN IT UP TO HIGHEST VOL-
UME . . . FEEDBACK SCREECH BLASTS EVERYONE
AWAKE . . . THEN WE MAKE THE ANNOUNCE-
MENT . . . WAKE up! . . . YOU ARE FREE . . .
THE GUARDS ARE OFFED . . . CLIMB THE FENCE
. . . ESCAPE ... GO HOME . . . (i'm TRYING
TO THINK OF SOFT FLOWERS ... ) AS YOU RUN
DOWNSTAIRS TIP OVER CAN OF PAINT CLEANER
. . . THROW MATCH ON IT . . . WHILE I'm AN-
NOUNCING THE ESCAPE YOU START FIRES IN 310
AND THE WEST AREA . . . WE RUN TO THE
SOUTHWEST CORNER OF FENCE UNGUARDED BY
GUN TRUCK AFTER MIDNIGHT . , . NINETY SEC-

90 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

ONDS LATER WE'RE PICKED UP ON THE HIGHWAY
... IN TEN MINUTES WE HAVE SLAIN TEN
GUARDS, FREED THE PRISON, BURNED DOWN THE
JOINT ... AN EXEMPLARY ACTION . . . KILL
US ON THE RUN ROBOT MONSTERS FOR WE WILL
NOT LIVE AS CAGED ANIMALS WE WILL NOT LIVE
AS DOCILE CAPTIVES WE CANNOT LIVE IMPRISONED
WE CHOSE TO DIE FREE RATHER THAN LIVE EN-
SLAVED (end tape).

I burst through the swinging doors of the visit-
ing room. She waits in the most private corner,
table arranged with Coffee, Rolls, Cigarettes.^ She
has a Persian beaded bag. She is beautiful. She
has strange news.

- The Whisper manuscript finally arrived and
I really dug it. It justified all your claims. Aries
was eager to see it. He's not a literary person, so
he gave it to Michael Horowitz and Bob Barker,
archivists of the Fitzhugh Ludlow Memorial Li-
brary in San Francisco. They immediately identi-
fied Whisper's writing as plagiarism. Some of it
from Samuel Beckett. Most of it stolen from a
young English writer named Brian Barritt who
wrote a book called Whisper a collage of words
smuggled out of Her Majesty's prison between
November 15, 1966, and September 19, 1969.

- Now I know what he meant when he said he
wasn't an author. He's not even Brian BarrittI

- Aries's suspicions were right all along. This
mystery of Whisper and his influence over our
lives! The whole thing is counterfeit. Read this.

jhefflves me Xerox pages from Samuel Beckett's
hook The Unnamable.

- I smuggled out the most poetic parts. But

92 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

there are many prosaic pages that come from his
own experience.

- They discussed that. Whisper is part plagiarist
and part paraphrast. If that's any comfort.

- I told everyone it was the finest prose of the
twentieth century.

- Everyone admires your literary taste.

- But he is wise. He's consciously counterfeit-
ing. He's copying verbal formulas to produce the
desired solution. He kept saying, I've got a copy-
right. He's a good plagiarist.

- Not good enough.

~ What does Aries suggest?

- He's amused. And amazed. He's ready to go
in two or three weeks.

•- What about Whisper?

- Aries says pay him and get him off the scene.

I gotta talk to Whisper.

- ^She says that your book is plagiarized from
an Enghshman named Brian Barritt.

- What did you say tocher?

- What could I say? Who are you, anyway?

- I'm a script writer. A prescription forger.

- I had you touted as the greatest writer of the
century. We were getting you a job with Grove
Press. To edit your own writing.

- I'd like that. How much does it pay?

- What about plagiarism?

- I told you plagiarism is the only honest
literary form. I write script. If it's done accurately,
I get it filled.

- Aries says to pay you off and hope you'll be
quiet.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 9b

Whisper is irritated.

- Still hanging on to labels? I'm not interested
in their single information level. I push enthusiasm
and its side effects. If that script is accurate it will
get you free. If I can help you by splitting, Til do it.
If you want me to drive the escape car or hide
you out, 111 do that or if you want me to just go
away and leave you alone, tell me. Just don't blow
my cover and leave me here. I've got no money
for bail and no way to free myself. Whisper is
just prison script. If I were a better engraver I'd
print the three thousand dollars and the ID. I
told you it was risky to smuggle that script out. To
decompose is to live too.

Waiting in the corridor outside the visit room,
looking out the window I see Her arrive in a taxi.
She said that Aries was ready to do it. We talked
of Jonathan Jackson, seventeen, walking into the
Marin County Courthouse armed with love for a
convict. All free men in prison have dreamed of a
Jonathan Jackson. The enthusiasm level mounted.

- There's still my promise to Whisper. You'U
have to meet him. Give him the^getavyay money.
Get diagrams and details on breakout from him.

- That's no problem. Have him come to
Berkeley.

- Monda/s his day off. Wait for him tomorrow.
Work out with him the details on when and where
I get picked up Saturday night.

I put the question to Whisper. - Can you leave
tonight or tomorrow to meet Her in Berkeley?

- Why so soon?

94 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

- Because I want to go over the wall Saturday.
~ OK. Ill go.

I give Whisper the numbers, codes.

— ril be back here Tuesday with the word.

Whisper comes Wednesday a long day late.

- What happened?

- Fuck-up all around, man. Couldn't make it to
Berkeley. Started driving to Monterey Airport
Monday morning. A terrible drive along a deserted
burning twat with the daughters of the swollen
manges splashing the crumbling stone. I got think-
ing about the danger of my being seen taking a
plane to San Francisco. I saw the whitewalled
wheels of life hanging in the sky. A smeD of burn-
ing rubber, incense. God was praying to his God,
flicking the vehicles along their asphalt rosary
beads. "Holy Mother of Jesus don't let me be
late" says an accident statistic racing toward the
rendezvous. I decided to drive to Berkeley past
cars dragging black bellies on metallic highways,
copulating with beetles at central junctions, ex-
creting cogs and black oil. Cellulose orgasms
snapped passers-by with big iron cunts, shattered
eye lamps, and mindless mechanical screams.
Then my car broke down, seduced by a huge red
bus. I was spread-eagled over a traffic light and
brutally assaulted. Cheering passengers mastur-
bate with torn-off arms, ejaculating over NO SPIT-
TING signs, shaving genitals with broken glass

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 95

^and vomiting black oil. Missed a day of work wait-
ing.

- Why didn't you go on Tuesday?

- Because I went up on Monday. By bus? It
didn't feel right. It's a mistake for me to go to your
house. You told me the place is staked out, man.
It's too dangerous. I'll go up Monday and meet

j^our wife in some neutral place.

- Where?

- Tell her_ straight on until she reaches the
cerebral cortex, reverse past the thalamus at
Lahore by the Badshi Mosque, then follow the
sunshine until she reaches the heart, India. Or
better yet, I'll meet her here in San Luis Obispo
next Sunday night after Jier visit. Don't be im-
patient. You gotta learn the prison lesson man.
Patience. Your impatience had me hurrying all
around the state exposed to amphibious slug crea-
tures evolved from recessive mutations and me-
chanical rape. We'll work it out down here.

- I'll write her to bring the money.

- There's no hurry. Your written words jump
about like stranded fish, fusing into fantastic mov-
ing sculptures, rearranging themselves in pahn-
dromes that read the same from any angle. If she
doesn't get the message we'll meet the next week.

- But I am in a hurry. The Poughkeepsie
sheriffs may come this week. Most hkely they'll
come Monday the thirty-first. I'm due in court
there on Tuesday after Labor Day. You phone her
tonight and tell her to bring the money so that the
whole thing can be worked out this week.

- Keep cool. Labor Day is September 7. That's

96 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

all these pigs are talking about these days. A three-
day holiday for the yags^ — hairless khaki-colored
baboons with bunches of yellow fingers and enor-
mous permanent erections that weave back and
forth like cobras and strike at any aperture within
reach. We'll work something out next Sunday the
thirtieth. And you split the following Saturday.
September 5. TTiat's the perfect weekend to do it.
Yag force will be cut in half. They even pull in
some of the gun trucks on holiday weekends.
Only new inexperienced yags on duty. They'll be
snowed with work, lead, and boiling piss. Septem-
ber 5 is ideal.

- rd like you to phone JtJ^ tonight.

— No. Your phone is tapped. The sound system
is operated by spider men, coil-headed pink lizards
who weave the mercurial plasma along which the
sound is carried. A tapped call from San Luis
arranging for escape money and a meeting? Cool
it man. Be patient and youll be free.

/ She is a slim brown soft-eyed girl waiting for
/ me in the visiting room. She had a busy week.

Aries came by Tuesday morning. He was
pleased about Whisper's call. Said it was time
to move. Ready for the escape this week.

Aries told me to pack my bag and get ready for
a sudden trip. It was to meet my contact person
in a restaurant.

Monday evening I jumped every time the phone
rang, expecting a call from Whisper or my con-

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 97

tact. At last it came. A girl's voice. Hello. This
is.Pam. Haven't seen you for a long time. Let's
get together tonight. Usual place? Nine o'clock.
I left J. to wait for Whisper's call. Dressed in dark
colors and started walking down the hill. It was
a soft night and as far as I could tell no one
following. I stuck out my thumb when I saw
a sister in a car and she drove within a couple of
blocks. I chose an inconspicuous table and a glass ^
of wine. A beautiful electric-green-eyed girl walked
up to the table . . . and said how good to see
you. I looked into her warm laughing eyes and
stood up and we embraced and I knew I had met
a sister. She told me to get a car for tomorrow
and be ready to leave the house for a three-day
trip. Super Jay managed to borrow a car.

Tuesday morning he drove me down Telegraph
Avenue until I told him to stop a block from
Pam's motel. He didn't know what was happen-
ing but he didn't ask any questions. He gave me
the keys said the gas tank was full and asked if
there was anything else he could do. I knocked
on Pam's door. She was ready to go. San Jose
was unfamiliar territory but we quickly found
the wig shop and photographers in the phone
book. We had a heavy schedule. Wig makeup,
photographs, license bureau, library, social secu-
rity card.

Getting a new head took the most time. I never
knew there could be so many kinds of wigs. Every
plastic lady on the street must own one. I eyed
the long luxurious darkfalls and the high proud
Afro scalps arranged around the mirrored room.
Blondie was bad. Blond and curly was worse./

98 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

But Pam said that's what it had to be. The Keith
Richard's Venusian birds plumage was out. Too
stylish. Looking at myself in the mirror I saw
the faces of my midwestern cousins. Oh lord must
I look this way? Fresh from the beauty shop
plastic lady. The longer I looked the less I liked
her. But have a little sympathy. What's her story?
Twenty-eight. Single. She needs makeup her skin
is too sallow. What's her name? Margaret Ann
McCreedy. CathoUc. Lived with her parents until
last month got her own apartment in Berkeley.
Supersecretary for an insurance firm. Not quite
a virgin. Mi^t be having a httle affair with a
married junior executive. Wears sturdy white
underwear. Must I buy a bra? Just gave up wearing
girdles.

Let's see what emerges after some makeup.
Department store cosmetics. Orange-pink lipstick.
Dark brown eyebrow pencil. False eyelashes. Need
help there. The salesgirl was obliging.

OK Pam. Behold Margaret Ann McCreedy. I
felt weird. What a change! Young people didn't
see me. I got eyed by military types and middle-
aged lusters aU over town, but kids looked right
thru me.

We arrived in New York late the next day. I was
nervous checking with the desk clerk. I'd used
so many fake names I'd forgotten which one I
planned to use. I had no ID for that name. I felt
illegal.

Next morning to the passport office in the cold-
j steel federal building. I filled out forms using
national holidays for my parents;' birthdays. My

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 99

occupation is student. I'm the only grandchild.
My grandmother was bom in London. Blah. Blah.

I was worried about the driver's license so I
held up my right hand and pledged allegiance
smiUng and thanking him. He told me I could
come back and pick it up that afternoon. Leaving
I checked out the elevators and stair exits in case
I had to split fasti

Went to a health-food store and drank carrot
juice. I felt paranoid about the youngish crew
cut at the next table. Back to the hotel and re-
turned to the passport office at four. It was almost
empty. Heavy men's voices from inner rooms. A
fat woman clerk was talking on the phone with
an index file in front of her. A long wait and she
asked me my name. I couldn't remember itl I
flushed and dropped my bag. I prayed. I stood up
and said Margaret Ann McCreedy. I took the/
passport and fled back to hotel. That night we'
flew back to San Francisco. I wish you could see
my passport picture. It's so funny. I've got the
passport buried under the bamboo on the sun deck
at Berkeley. I hope it doesn't rain.

Then I waited for Whisper. When he didn't
show that blew it for this week. I was furious.
Waiting is frustrating and dangerous.

- Whisper is coming to Berkeley tomorrow,
Hell come this time because he's planning not to
come back. Hell take the money and the ID and
spht.

100 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

It was a slow week until the next visit.

- I thought we'd never meet here again. What
happened?

- Well, Monday Whisper didn't show. Once
again I was glued to the phone all day. All night.
Aries kept calling. 'Cause the moment Whisper
would show the word would go out that the escape
was on. You didn't know any of this of course and
I wouldn't write you. Tuesday same thing. All
day and night. Aries calling. His entire apparatus
was poised. His people have come down from
the mountains or somewhere. Dozens of them
waiting around so they could free you last night.
It was torture. Same thing Wednesday. By this
time I'm confused and depressed. Wednesday
around seven Aries calls for a final check. He's
with aU his people. When I said Whisper hadn't
showed he was very disappointed and said he'd
have to send them all back and that we'd have
to postpone the escape. For several weeks. Until
after your Poughkeepsie trial. The gloom was
thick. Then fifteen minutes later Whisper showed
up. Wasted. He could hardly stand. I immediately
called Aries. But it was ten minutes too late. His
people had just left.

- Next week?

- Maybe. If the Poughkeepsie police don't take
i you and if Aries can get his people together again.
\lt's costing them time and energy and money to
\sit around week after week. I gave Whisper the

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 101

money and the ID and asked him for the diagrams.
He jiist smiled and mumbled something about
wanting you to go over the fence in broad day-
light. He keptJaughlBg^nd saying 'Ibroad day-
light."(Tie Jcept mumbUng^about tne Book of Job,
iron maidens, abortion gorgers, drug traffic, hail
Mary, lone-time, cannabis, wars, time-space, sub-
lunia. He had a written list of wog cars and kept
mumbling about laser danger, electron watch,
and the torture barracks outside the fence. He
was scared and spaced out.

ft was our last talk in prison. I told her that I
couldn't let myself be captured passively and live
the rest of my Ufe in a metal cage. Tell them they
can carry guns in the escape.

- I've gone through the same changes. Telep-
athy.

- The Marin County shoot-out Jonathan Jack-
son?

- Me too.

- I'm going to write a political escape message.
For Aries. Shoot to live. Aim for life.

Then She told me to make my words ring solid
like the clang of a steel chisel on stone.
The escape manifesto. I wrote in code.

There is the day of laughing Krishna and the
day of grim Shiva. The conflict which we have
sought to avoid is upon us.

It is a comfortable, self-indulgent cop-out to
look for conventional economic-political solutions.

This is a war for survival Like Huey and An-
gela. They dig it.

102 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

There is no choice left but to defend life
against the genocidal machine.

There are no neutrals in genetic warfare.

Do not be deceived. It is a classic stratagem
of genocide to camouflage their wars as law-and-
order police actions.

Remember the Sioux and the pogroms and the
black slaves and the indignation over airline hi-
jackings!

If you fail to see that we are the victims of
genocidal war you will not understand the rage
of the blacks, the fierceness of the Weathermen,
and the pervasive resentment of the young.

Our government is a lethal instrument.

Remember the buffalo and the Iroquois!

In this life struggle we use the ancient holy
strategies of organic life:

ESCAPE 1) in the loyalty of underground sister-
hoods and brotherhoods.
ESCAPE 2) passively, break lockstep . . . drop

out.
ESCAPE 3) actively, sabotage, jam the computer

... trash every lethal machine in

the land.
ESCAPE 4) publicly, announce life . . . denounce

death.
ESCAPE 5) privately, guerrilla invisibility.
ESCAPE 6) beautifully, create organic art, music.
ESCAPE 7) biologically, conspire with seed.
ESCAPE 8) spiritually, stay high . . . blow the

mechanical mind . . . dose them . . .
ESCAPE 9) physically. Aim for life and shoot to

live.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 103

WARNING: I am armed and should be con-
sidered dangerous to anyone who threatens my
life or my freedom.

Tuesday, September 8, 1970, is the 203d day
of my captivity. I am waiting for the decision if
the escape will be in four days . . . slow time
... I miss talking to Whisper. No one to write to
because ^She^s, en route to our next meeting. I
check the sky. The weather reports predict blue
and cloudless. The moon is approaching full . . .
the wind is from the west. Tonight there's an
ominous clear lunar glow. . . . Aries won't do it
if there's a full moon. . . . He's cautious. , . %
Everyone said wait until a foggy winter night . . ,
I'm the one who is impatient , . . it's my life,

Wednesday, September 9, 1970, 204th day of
captivity. Strange hush calm . . . waiting. . . .
I am called into the legal office. The pigs tell me
that I leave in handcuffs for New York on Tues-
day, September 15. The chief con clerk walks
into office. - Hey man do you want to move to
a two-man cell . . . you're eligible for a move.
We'll pick you out a good cellmate. ... - Where
is it? ... — Just where you want to move to
. . . 324 . . . down by the handball court. . . .
It's a miracle to be moved next to the escape wire
... So perfect I'm suspicious . . . who is the
roommate? Angelo ... he works in Receiving.
... I spend all my spare time with Burroughs
asking him questions about escape. He wonders
why. The weatherman sees clear skies . . . every-

104 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

one knows Fm leaving for Poughkeepsie. . . «
- Hey man, when you leaving. ... - I may
leave Saturday ... or Tuesday ... I may not
come back . . . Angelo my cellmate is a tense
good man ... He shows me pictures of his Cad-
illac agency . . . he's in for receiving stolen prop-
erty . . . cars . . . his wife comes every week.
. . . There are only five cons in the prison whose
wives come every week. . . . Angelo spends four
hours every night writing his wife letters with in-
structions about car repairs ... he is a kind
devoted citizen with normal larceny. . . . He's
worried about the weather too ... if it's sunny
we can be with our wives on the lawn. ... He
tells me to pray for sunny day. . . . The weather
forecast for Thursday. Morro Bay and San Luis
Obispo . . . early morning and late evening fog.
Ootherwise clear and sunny. . . .

Thursday, September 10, 1970, the 205th day
of my captivity ... no lav^er visit ... no
word . . . there's less privacy in a two-person
cell than in the large open dorm. . . . Angelo my
cellmate is popular ... all the business cons
and Italians come to visit and the cell crams wdth
vibrations ... he tenderly drives his friends
away . . . we'll keep it private and quiet here
he says. . . . He's pleased to hve v^th me. I'm
glad to look out the John and study the escape
wire. . . . After lunch I change into shorts and
start doing yoga on the lavm SIX FEET AWAY
FROM CABLE POLE. Looking at the cable with
half-open Hds while standing on my head. A pig
rumbles up. It's a violation doing exercises here.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 105

A woman might drive by the outside gate and
see you in shorts. I wash my blue socks and hang
them on the guy wire supporting the cable pool.
. . . Good luck to touch tihe pole. Walk around it.

Friday, September 11, 1970, the 206th day of
my captivity. At 7:00 a.m. the prison whistle
wakes me. Eye flash to window: Ice-blue sky. The
soft gray furry fog of morning has vanished. A
perfect rifle target is a body under full moon
silhouetted in the glare of the guardhouse lights.
The ritual of powdered steaming sink-water cof-
fee. Shave, make bunk, three hours until the law-
yer's visit, if he's coming. Venus is parallel Sat-
urn. . . .

At 8:00 A.M. I walk to custody ofiice past the
6ld cons sitting arthropods on the law. Blue denim
tombstones sunning on the steps and benches
staring, sitting spitting talking strolling nowhere
on a sunny prison morning. Broken robots pushing
shuffleboard disks at nowhere with molasses mo-
tions. Watering lawns. Tossing coins at a hole in
the ground. Fourteen hundred men doing nothing
going no place being no one. I want to build an
hourglass fifty feet high for watching grains of
time slowly drain down the terminal sewer of
American jurisprudence.

At 8:45 I sit at the desk waiting FOR THE
WIRE ANNOUNCING THE ESCAPE. THE
TICKET TO FREEDOM IS A YELLOW SLIP OF
PAPER.

It is now 8 : 50. Fm studying the clock counting
seconds. I split Custody and move quietly down
the hallway past old Henry sweeping the floor.

106 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

He has twenty years in straight and talks to him-
self.

Reviewing the escape blueprints. The guard-
house lights are in a direct line of sight from the
gun trucks. Anyone on that cable is a pigeon. If
and when you make a break you'll be in a brand-
new situation. There's no help you can call on.
Your New York lawyers can't do shit for you
then. There's no appeal from a .30 caliber sum-
mons. You'll be hunted down by sharpshooters.
They don't hke escapes. You should wait until
December to make your break.

Get transferred to the east end of the compound
and some foggy winter night just climb the fence
and disappear into the mist.

Fog, man. Fog. Or you'll go out of here on a
stretcher.

You haven't learned that the first lesson of a
convict is patience. You'll be home by Christmas.

By the time I returned to Custody it was 9:40.
Drank another coffee, palms sweating. At 10:20
a monotone voice squawked over the speaker.

I am wanted in Legal Office, Building 310.

I walked down the corridor of the administra-
tive building. Two counselors were leaning against
the door of Legal Office. The room was filled with
smirking policemen. One big fat smile stepped
forward to shake my hand. Sergeant Mervers him-
self from Poughkeepsie.

- How are you, Tim? He laughed.

It was a big moment for Sergeant Mervers. Next
to him sat an old deputy and two local San Luis
sheriffs.

- We came early to find out if you're willing to

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 107

fly back. If you won't fly then we leave today by
car.

They were taking no chances on last-minute
legal maneuvers. It also gave them a free trip to
L.A. They looked relieved when I said Fd fly.

Fm too restless for the oflice. Too restless for the
library. I sit on lawn in lotus position listening to
my ears beating and the whisper of inhale-exhale.
I won't leave this spot until the word comes. Sweat-
ing in the hot sun. Waiting. I hear the faint click
of the PA system and the soft hum of feedback.

- Wanted in the control office.

The Sergeant's face was sympathetic. I auto-
graphed the receipt and held the yellow sheet.

TELEGRAPH FORM

BELOVED OPERATION TOMORROW^ DOCTORS FEEL
BEST NOT TO WAIT TOTALLY OPTIMISTIC ABOUT
SUCCESS AND NEW LIFE DON'T WORRY fLL BE
BRAVE won't be DOWN TO VISIT SUNDAY BUT
we'll be together SOON I AWAIT YOU I LOVE
YOU CONTACT ME AT THREE TREE RECOVERY
CENTER.

YOUR MATE

I walked into the prison yard and looked west
to the sea where the weather came from. Three
small dime-sized clouds were drifting in. First
friendly weather in weeks. Venus conjoins Jupiter
at 4°. Scorpio for tremendous benefits. Either ma-
terial or emotional or both.

I ponder the timing of the flight. At 9:00 p.m.
television programs change and hallways fill with
moving cons. Should I leave five minutes before

108 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

or five minutes after nine? Precise timing. Hit
tree and over roof. Two minutes. One minute to
cross the wire. Quarter mile to highway figure
four minutes. Half a mile to three trees. That's
eight more. Fifteen minutes from trees to getaway.
There's a fifty-fifty chance Til be seen and will
have to make a fast break in the dark for the high-
way hoping to intercept the pickup car.

- We ain't gonna be out on the lawn Sunday
with our wives, Angelo complained. I hope it clears
up.

If I cHmb the tree at 9:05, 111 meet the car at
9 : 20, or better yet run out onto highway and flag
it down. But no time for delay. One person stand-
ing in the hallway could keep me from going out
the door. If I spht at 8 : 55 Yd have a ten-minute
cushion. But if the alarm sounds it's dangerous
waiting along the highway.

Walking to the gymnasium for the Friday night
movie I saw a cloud bank moving in from the west.
The moon was rising almost full in the east.

When the movie ended at 9:00 p.m. the clouds
were thicker. If this weather holds I'll be free
tomorrow.

Back in the cell I started clearing out my locker.
I gave Angelo all my food and supplies. Menzies, a
sly runner from Control, came by and flagged me
out. We stood at the end of the hall. He watched
behind me and I watched behind him.

- Moore and the goon squad were checking your
property list. They were hot about your books.
Superintendent Field from East Facility called over.
If you have anything fishy going on with books you
better cover your tracks. Maybe it has something

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 109

to do with that Black mihtant they just shipped out
to Folsom. Have you been loaning books to Blacks?
Don't let on you were tipped off. They could trace
it back to me.

I drove over to Burroughs's cell.

- Hey man, where's that Bobby Scale book.
Seize the Time?

- I passed it on to one of the Brothers.

- I got to have it back.

- I can dig it. Come with me.

We drove to the next cellblock. I stood by the
door while Burroughs reached under the mattress
and pulled out the book.

Lying in bed I reviewed tomorrow's schedule.
The guard's heavy boots trampled along the cor-
ridor, his voyeur flashlight fingering the dark
privacy. Tomorrow night at this time youll have a
buzz, my friend.

Angelo woke me up. Eye sprang to the window.
Soft gray misty clouds. Security blanket. Good
weather for a night flight. Angelo was complaining.

- Fucking clouds. We won't be able to see our
wives on the lawn tomorrow.

Angelo brought me steaming coffee. I lay in bed
reviewing the twenty-two tarot cards. One wait
for moonless night. Two wait for fog. Three on a
Saturday night wait until the patrol car returns
from CMC East with the snack-bar trustees,
around 9:00. Four just before flight paint white
trim on*sneakers black. Five write farewell note
and leave in locker. Six exit must be made before
or after the TV break when prisoners flood hall-
ways. Seven wait until the central corridor is
empty or when all prisoners walking have their
backs to side door. Eight shp out side door and
walk to the tree five seconds. Nine climb tree five
seconds. Ten leap to roof silently. Eleven remove
sneakers. Twelve lie on roof checking security
location of guards and patrol cars. Thirteen if
seen be prepared to make visible desperate break,
counting on five-minute delay to notify control
tower. Fourteen crawl along the roof of corridor

112 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

to Building 324 sixty seconds. Fifteen silently creep
along roof of 324, avoiding TV antenna wires sixty
seconds. Sixteen put on sneakers and handball
gloves. Seventeen hang from wire by hands and
feet and pull self across ninety seconds. Eighteen
slide down pole on other side of fence five seconds.
Nineteen chmb down bank and cross through
outer prison compound avoiding barracks, alert
for the fire watch. Reach highway in four minutes.
Twenty turn right on Highway 1 and run half mile
to turnoff with three trees four minutes. Twenty-
one wait for pickup car with right blinker flashing.
Twenty-two my contact is Kelly. My name is TINO,
and the Soker's wild Angelo brought me back.

- Hey man. What are you thinking about? See-
ing your wife Sunday, right?

- Making plans.

- I'm going to miss you when you go Tuesday.
Youll never come back here. I've heard them
talking in the Release Office. They expect you to
get bailed out. But if you pick up another convic-
tion and a third sentence in New York you'll be
carrying too much time for a minimum security
prison. Once you leave you better not come back to
California or you'll be in a dungeon at Folsom.
Pack all your stuff in a box, your radio and type-
writer. The cons in R and R will keep it for you and
have it mailed out wherever you end up.

Two in the afternoon. The sun breaks through.
But friendly clouds are waiting ofip the coast.

Counting, I pace the yard. Four minutes to the
road. Five minutes to the three trees. I join the
line for early chow. The last supper on metal
plates. I drive back to the cellblock and sit in a

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 113

darkened TV room watching the Stanford-Arkan-
sas football game.

Lying on bunk for four o'clock count. The sec-
onds moving fast now. The four thirty count clear
whistle loosened. Tramping feet to chow. Angelo
was combing his hair.

- Coming to dinner?

— I ate on the early line.

Waiting for the cellblock to clear. Now. Move to
locker. Rip white laces from sneakers and rethread
brown. I sit crouched facing the locker, a news-
paper in my lap. Unscrew Flanagan's black print
tube. Slash pigment over white stripping on
sneakers. Hasty daubing. Hear steps. Jangle of
guard keys. Shove shoes in locker. Wait. The
guard goes. Sweaty hands are black from smearing
pigment on smooth rubber. I shove the shoes in
the locker to dry. Put on handball gloves. Brush
black on backs. The paint leaks onto hands. Toss
in locker and shut door.

I scrub hands with coarse bristle brush. Mop
paint off floor with a towel. Shove under my mat-
tress.

When the eight thirty count clear whistle is
sounded Angelo sphts. I whisper ommmmmm as
gears chck in motion. Bending over to lace black
sneakers. Put on dark blue denim jacket. Eye-
glasses. Shove Hej^ letters, prison IDs, meditation
beads in pocket.

It's about time. 8:53. I drive to tl^e end of cell-
block out to the corridor. Walking down corridor to
the intersection praying the coast's clear. Two cons
watch me drive by. A patrol pig approaches.

114 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

- Are you still here? We're tired of seeing you
around.

- Fm on my way. Wish me luck.

- Good luck, said the guard.

Drive up hallway and U-turn back. They're still
there watching me roll past.

Turn the corner and make a pass through neigh-
bor cellblock.

I stand indecisive. Trapped, feehng the clock
moving. Gotta hurry. Ill miss the highway pickup.
Suspicious standing. I slowly head down the hall
again. Praying. Look left. The two cons are stiU
there. Keep moving on the side corridor to end.
Circle back. Time wasting. Gotta hurry. Hit corner.
They're gone. Moving surely toward exit door.
Look right. Inside door of cellblock three cons
talking. They feel my hesitation and look up. I
drive past next two cellblocks. U-turn. Have to
bluff it through. If I move smoothly to door 111 be
invisible. At the last second before reaching for the
door handle I flick a glance to the cellblock. Three
heads turn to look. I walk past. Blew it. Should
have slipped through. Gotta move. At the inter-
section I turn north. Past Metcalf the snitch. New
plan. There's another door to the exercise yard
down the corridor. Have to walk across the yard.
At night? Strictly off hmits. K seen they sound
alarm. No choice. I opened the door and walked
out onto the hard lit by floodUghts. I moved silently
across yard. Fifty windowpanes watched my des-
perate path. No one walks the yard in dead of
night Not even the pigs. I stood in front of the
tree. The tree stood directly in front of window.
Inside the corridor facing the window stood Met-

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 115

calf braying at two cons. I can't climb a tree two
feet in front of the snitch I

I sat down on the steps leading to the hallway.
Trapped in the spotlight, wandering in verboten
yard with paint-blacked sneakers. If I sit in the
glare for the guards to see, 111 get busted with
blackened handball gloves in my pocket and the
farewell notes in locker? Time froze. I watched
the leaves of the tree glistening and the muffled
sound of Metcalf 's voice. Now or never. Now, 1 got
up and walked to the tree. I'll have to climb in
front of Metcalf. It will take him five minutes to
sound the alarm and another five minutes to get
the two-man gun trucks on the road. Make or
break. As I approached the tree as in a dream I
heard MetcalFs voice booming good night and saw
him turn away from window. In escape, as in
impregnation, cellular intersection, and tantric
union the margin of hfe-death is seven seconds.
My neurology shifts into some ancient, primate,
dreamy survival pattern, I grabbed a branch,
wrapped foot around tree limb, swung upward
foot-hand-foot-hand balanced on a slender branch
leaned across the void and dropped softly f ourfoot
on the roof of the corridor.

I sat breathing quietly on the tar-paper slant
listening to voices trampUng in the hallway below.
I could look down over the entire prison camp.
The empty yards floodlit. Across to the custody
ofl&ce where I could see lounging brownshirt pigs.
Guards in squad rooms. I was hidden in shadows
above the searchUghts. I was a forest creature
scanning the camp of humans.

Sitting on the jailhouse roof I stripped off the

116 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

sneakers and holding them in left hand crept
silently along the roof to the end of the corridor,
climbed up the ridge slant and down to the roof
of 324. The rough roofing rasped, my feet creak-
ing, snapping, popping. BE QUIET, REMEMBER
THERE ARE 100 SNITCHES BELOW WHOXL
HEAR YOU AND RUN TO PHONE GUARD. A
sudden start. I bumped into the TV antenna wires.
I could look down on either side into the neigh-
boring cellblocks. My silhouette was exposed
against the sky. I laughed. By this time I realized
all was out of rational control. On autopilot. Every
detail of the plan gone wrong. It was all pro-
grammed by some higher computer.

Slowly picked my way to the roof end looking
down over road, fence, compound, and way below
car lights on the highway. I sat down and laced
the right sneaker.

The socks in my pocket. I put on the left sock
and tied the sneaker. Pulled on handbaU gloves.
I lay down on the angled roof just under the
cable. Grabbed it with hands and hooked ankles.
I reached my hands above my head and pulled out
on the wire.

It was hard going. The cable had wire looped
every ten inches holding a telephone cord below.
My legs bumped and tangled in the wire. There
were no smooth easy sweeping pulls. Reach hands.
Pull body ten inches. Pull leg. Hands up. Pull
body. Haul legs. The cable bouncing and swinging.
A strain to hang on. Wrenched my hands. Strain
legs. Weird wrestling motions, my body clinging
to the swaying wire. Sweating. Heaving awk-
wardly. After fifty pulls — a pause. Horrid discov-

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 117

ery. Completely exhausted. Lungs gasping. Arms
drained of energy. Body limp and weak. Can't go
another foot. Only one-third across the wire.
Hadn't even reached the road. The wire was longer
than expected. Two-thirds to go. Exhausted. My
hands can't hold the weight of my body. With
desperate sexual writhing I embraced the cable
with elbows and knees. Rested. The cable was
slowly swinging. Nightmare thoughts. What are
you doing this time? Inefficient wizard danghng
from a cable twenty feet high escaping from life
imprisonment in full view of two gun trucks?
Once again the little experiment has gotten out of
hand, Professor. Turned my head horizontal to-
ward the gun truck. The interior hght snapped on.
He's seen me. Put on hght to sound alarm. The
word is flashing. I'm pendant waiting for patrol
cars to scream up. WiU they poke me down like a
wild raccoon with sticks? Danghng, I had to laugh.
Dangling from a swinging wire I start squirm-
ing toward life. Five more wrenching feet. Stop.
Wrists and arms exhausted. Panting. I should
have quit smoking. I should have pushed more
iron. It seemed so easy. Now I know why no cons
have escaped this way. Oljmipic gymnastics on a
high wire in the gunsights. I should have waited
until the winter fog. Maybe they leave the cable
strung over the fence as a trap? They're hunters
waiting in trucks, rifles cradled on knees, waiting
for wild animals to blunder into the ambush?
The slaughter hole. My hands trembling could
hold no more. With desperate lunge I hooked
elbows over the wire, with clumsy crabhke grabs
pulled body along by elbows. Stop to rest. Look

118 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

down at macadam road sixteen feet below and
over into TV rooms where cons watch the shadow
tube.

A sudden glare of light. Forty feet away a patrol
car slowly turns from the compound road toward
me. Tm captured. The auto rolls closer, a soft
crunch of tires on gravel. My blue denim arms
turned yellow in the headlight. I looked down di-
rectly at the guard leaning over to crush his ciga-
rette in the ashtray. Car roUed by to the corner
and disappeared.

Now tumble into some delirious trance. Arms
crossed, elbows hooked to wire inching caterpillar
crawl. All hope of escape given up. My only goal
to reach the fence so Td faU to freedom outside
the perimeter. I must remember when I fall to let
feet go first. My hand kept getting tangled in the
phone wire loop. A compulsive wrench to free my
hand sets the cable bouncing wildly. Mouth gasp-
ing, face bulging, glasses twisted, sweat dripping,
face grimacing. Another skin of the teeth. I
wanted Errol Flynn and out came Harold Lloyd.
I felt very alone. Forty-nine years and 325 days
of this life built up to this moment of ordeal. My
life hung on a needle point. In trance of Sun
Dance initiates whirl suspended by hooked burn-
ing pain in the chest muscles. There was no fear
only a nagging embarrassment. Such an undigni-
fied way to die, nailed like a sloth on a branch!
Other men and women in prison would be pained
by my failed escape. My fall would please the
guards. See we told you. You can't escape. There
is no escape.

No more thoughts. From some inner reservoir

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 119

of LIVE! LIVE! LIVE I SURVIVE I came an energy
flow and a curious erotic lightness. Hands reached
up in easy strong pulls, legs kicking, body wig-
gHng, arms flailing, shoulders pushing propelled
by uterine squeeze. My glasses feU but my arms
smoothly reeled cable. Thus I butted head first
dripping wet into this New Life.

Hand over hand till fingers hit the pole. Hang-
ing by my legs (Fd practiced it a thousand times
in my bunk) I reached right hand over head,
grabbed metal spike, dropped legs, twisted body,
wrapped legs around splintery wood, slid down.
Exultant feet hit liberated ground I FREE I

8

SHE : I was packed and ready for Salt Lake early.
Called my favorite freak cabdriver. I met Pam at
the bus terminal and we headed for the airport. At
Salt Lake we dropped off at one hotel, walked
through the lobby with our bags, split out the side
door, and cabbed to another hotel.

We ate at a Steak House near the hotel. Pam
checked the number of the pay phone on the
parking lot next door.

We got back to the hotel around 8 : 00 and I sat
on the bed and started to center myself. I threw
the I Ching, consulted the tarot, took the beads
and prayed with all my might.
OM MAN! PADMA HUM

I was fully alert from 8:25 to 9: 15. Poised. Some
far-out electronic music came over the radio
around 8:30 like someone running, rushing en-
ergy up and up and a voice kept chanting FAR,
FAR, FAR. At 9: 15 came a great feeling of relief
and the tension disappeared. I felt calpi and peace-
ful. We listened to the radio until 11:00. I said,
Tm going to go to sleep, everything is all right. I
slept soundly.

122 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

I was swaying sweating panting. I- saw the
glasses lying on ground outside of fence. I adjusted
them on my nose, funny professor gesture. I
looked around. All silent. Electric lights shining
on the steel fence and the green grass. Cellblocks
forty feet away shining still in the night. No
motion.

I staggered to the wall, shd down, lay head
against the stone, drained, deeply breathing, Usten-
ing. Alert fox hiding from hunters, waiting for
pursuit cars to scream down road. Silence. I
started down the bank. The barracks of the open-
prison compound lay scattered below. Lights were
on. Watch for fire patrol. Steep decline. My first
steps dislodged a rock avalanche. I slipped and
slid, stones ratthng around me. Hit the hill bottom
and started loping carefully, probing, wary like a
kickoff return.

THERE'S A DRY CREEK BED CUTTING ACROSS THE
FIELD. KEEP TO THE LEFT. WATCH FOR BOULDERS.
BE CAREFUL NOT TO MAKE NOISE. THE FIRE WATCH
MAKES ROUNDS. A BIRD-DOG SNITCH. WHAT WILL
I DO IF I MEET HIM? YOU DON'T HAVE TO BE TOLD
WHAT TO DO. ONCE YOU CLIMB THAT FENCE YOU
ARE A HUNTED ANIMAL. KILLERS ARE AFTER YOU.
IF THE FIRE WATCH GETS IN YOUR WAY YOU'LL
DEAL WITH HIM OR YOU'LL NEVER DRAW ANOTHER
FREE BREATH.

I watched myself on the projection room screen.
B movie fugitive in blue denims skulking past

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 123

guardhouse. Halfway across the field I saw them
coming. From behind building shadows fifty yards
ahead two dark pig figures moving slowly beating
the dark bushes. The alarm is out! I had been seen I
The area swarming with pursuers! Guards with
guns a-hunting! I stopped. Senses alert. It was
all mammalian, shadow men moving up the hill
toward me. I fell down on my back, still heaving
breaths, nerve endings twitching, waiting. My
glasses steam from sweat. I wiped the lenses on
my sweater and peered down into shadows. Black
trees silhouetted in the yellow glow from the
barracks. The road ahead lit by street lights. The
men now hidden in shadows were moving slowly.
Hallucinations Doctor? Can't lie here helpless.
Gotta go. I walked slowly at full moon toward
freedom. The coast was clear. A thousand prison
windows watched me run across the field, feet
leaping, heart singing. It was all go now. I galloped
by the barracks, jumped down into a ravine,
scrambled up to the main prison gate along the
brilliantly lit road past the prison entrance sign
CALIFORNIA MEN'S COLONY WEST FACILITY
in fuU view waving adios under street light to
the railroad tracks loping north parallel to Highway
1. It was dreamlike simple. There were no actors
on the set that didn't belong.

Car lights approached from the rear. I dove
down on the tracks my face against cool steel,
hands in gravel. A middle-aged couple driving
north. Dangerous running, hiding along the tracks,
I picked a way down to the ravine bordering the
tracks.

Breathing hard legs exultant. My first free wild

124 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

run in seven months. Leaping joyful. Car lights
approaching. Dove into tall grass. Lie panting,
watching. If the right bUnker flashes Til run to
the road. I was regretting every Italian resistance
movie I had seen. Ridiculous sweating heroics.
Memo to central casting: No more adventure
flicks, please. Make the next one a South Sea
island porny.

Cars roared past. Get up running. Lights com-
ing. Hit dirt. Car lights coming. Hit dirt. How
far is half a mile?

Up ahead I saw the dim outline of trees next
to the highway. Chmbed out of the culvert and ran
to the first tree. Standing five feet from highway
at the base of the second tree, I saw three trees
joined at the root trunk. Well, they have the
symbols right.

A long wait for the pickup. Scanning the cars
roaring by. Two minutes. Five minutes. Ten min-
utes. Suppose they don't come? Maybe they got
busted? Accident? Fuck-up in plans? Hitchhiking
north on Highway 1 in prison garb?

A car is coming. Right blinker flashing. It
pulled up in front of the tree. I ran from the
shadows. The car door swung open. A girl with
long dark hair leaped out. Code words swapped.

- KeUyl

- Tinol

We embraced. I ducked into the back seat grab-
bing the hand of the blond girl behind the wheel.
Kelly jumped in slamming the door. Motor gunned
we roared off.

~ Fm Maru, said the driver.

- Where is She?

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 125

~ In Denver waiting for you. Youll see Jger
Monday.

I had mixed feelings. I hoped ghe^was out of
the country safe but exultant we'd meet in two
days.

Kelly was talking fast.

- Brother, we're glad to see you! We made two
passes by the pickup spot. We were worried. You
were late. I was going to start walking back the
tracks to look for you. In case you were hurt.

- How old are you?

- Eighteen.

- How old is Maru?

- She's nineteen.

Kelly pointed to the back seat. - There's a new
set of clothes. Change. I started stripping off prison
denim.

- Give them to me, said Kelly.

- rd like to save them. For Barker and Horo-
witz the archivists.

- No. We're going to transfer your clothes to
another car. They'll drive south near L.A. and
leave them in a gas station restroom. To make the
pigs think we're heading south.

- How many cars do you have operating to-
night?

- Four. You'll only be in this car for five min-
utes. We have a camper in Morro Bay to take you
to Oakland. A third car goes south. And the fourth
has the shortwave set to monitor poKce calls. How
much of a lead do we have?

- I don't think I was seen leaving. So we have
two hours before they discover I'm gone.

126 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

I passed over my prison ID, farewell note, Her
letters.

- Save these for the archivists.

- There's a wallet and set of IDs in the pocket.
Your name is William McMillan. Your birthday
is November 14, 1929. Your address is 2925
Northridge Road, Salt Lake City.

The car slowed down in the Morro Bay. Satur-
day night traffic. A quiet town. We turned right.

- What happens here?

We have a lookout posted. The car slowed by
the service station. The attendant, young, long
hair waved. Our car picked up speed.

- We flashed the message that we had you
and he flashed us that there is no police alarm
yet. So far so good.

Maru was driving smooth and easy. In four
minutes we reached a road by the beach. Car
stopped. Maru turned back grinning. - OK
brother. You get out now. I'll see you in Oak-
land.

I puUed the knit ski cap over my head and
followed Kelly out of the car over the sand dunes
down the beach. It was still a B movie, spy thriller.
World War II.

After a hundred yards Kelly turned away from
the sea, over dunes to a parked camper. A beauti-
ful woman waited. We kissed. A sturdy gray-haired
man came around the side of the camper and we
shook hands.

- Welcome.

KeUy motioned me in back of trailer.

- I'm going to dye your hair now. A strange
trailer just pulled up. They look suspicious. We

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 127

don't want to pull out suddenly. We'll hang
around here for a few minutes and then hit it.

I sat on the edge of the bunk bed. Kelly standing
at the sink filhng a pail of water. She squirted
spray-can hair dye on my scalp and began massag-
ing. After a while she stopped and smiled.

- Kelly is my code name, not my real name.
Fm not always a beautician. My father is Senator
and the name of our tribe is the Weather-
men Underground.

I began to laugh. It all figured. The manic
reckless guerrilla tribe. Scourge of the FBI.

- We had to keep it secret. We hope it's all
right with you.

I suddenly flashed on the meshing of under-
ground energy systems. Dogejd^alers^a^aJasenty-
five thousand dollars to finance thelSreakout. And
the bread goes to the manic guerrillas.

- The twenty-five thousand went to buy dyna-
mite? Kelly laughed.

- Dynamite, hair dye, and fast cars.

I was sitting on the floor of the camper, head
in the bucket, Kelly splashing water, when the door
opened. Frank poked his head in, cool, calm
fisherman.

- Reckon it's about time to spHt.

The truck engine revved up, I was standing by
the sink towehng my hair when we pulled away.
Kelly was laying out the plan.

- We drive to intersection on Highway 101.
Ill drop off there and switch to another car. You'll
drive north to Oakland. Well follow you with a
radio car. If the pigs start throwing up roadblocks
we'U stop you and pull off to a stash pad and wait

128 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

it out. If the coast is clear well drive to Oakland
and then tomorrow to Salt Lake City. Bernadine,
Jeff, Tom, and Mark are waiting for you there.
YouTl work out the next phase with them. They
would have come down tonight but they are
fugitives.

The camper stopped. Frank was at the door.

~ We're in the parking lot near the gas station.
This is the intersection of 101, said Kelly. Fm
dropping off here. Well be behind you all the way.
See you in Oakland.

Frank was tugging at the license plate with a
wrench. He pulled off California exposing Utah
plates. The bumper sticker said: AMERICA LOVE
IT OR LEAVE IT.

- Do you want me to ride in the back.

- You can ride in front with Martha and me
and the girl if you'd prefer.

I climbed in the cab. A ten-year-old girl with
shoulder-length brown hair was sitting next to
Martha. Frank started the truck. I was sitting with
Heather on my lap with my right arm holding
her and my left hand was in Martha's. Frank was
an American Legion hunting-fishing guy and
Martha was soft Mrs. Middle America and Heather
was everyone's TV girl — a Holy Family.

Martha ran it down. Heather had known about
the escape for six weeks. They explained how it
would help if she came along. And what the risks
were. - Will I go to jail she had asked. Heather
decided to do it. She said: - Jonathan Jackson
was only nineteen and look what he did. The
hardest thing for Heather was that she couldn't
tell her older brother.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 129

- This memory will be one of my most proud.
Rescued from prison by an eleven-year-old girl.

- Tm ten, said Heather.

I started telling Martha about the escape. For
the first time the whole seven-month charade
became a comedy. The complicated double game.
I thought of all the surprised people who would
be rerunning memory tapes and began to laugh.

Frank leaned over and asked me to run down
the options.

- When will they find out you are gone?

- At midnight.

He checked his watch.

- Well be in Salinas by then. Figure it takes
the State Police half an hour to be mobilized. The
danger of a roadblock will come between Sahnas
and San Jose. If we can make it to San Jose we'll
be in heavy traffic and they can't run a roadblock.

It was magic. The prison walls of Mordor. The
darkened moon. The three trees. The perfection
of the casting. Maru and Kelly as mythic heroines.
The pigs conscientiously practicing to act like pigs,
trimming their hair, rattling keys, dutifully fatten-
ing their asses, sticking out bellies. And the Holy
Family elegance of Frank and Martha and Heather.

Frank told me when it was midnight. I started
thinking aloud, laughing at the drama back in
prison. Right now they've discovered me missing
and phone messages are flashing back and forth
to Control and Custody and over to the east side.
And my ceUmate Angelo, excited, amused, puz-
zled, and a little scared wondering (as every con
wonders when anything happens) will this affect
my parole? They are calling for a recount now

130 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

and checking the grounds and when I'm still
missing the big whistle will blow its stack for long
minutes and everyone in the east and west facil-
ities will know there's been an escape. There are
going to be a hundred unhappy guards and three
thousand laughing inmates.

Frank checked the rear-view mirror.

- The follow-up car is with us. They'll let us
know if the alarm flashes. Pretty soon Martha
asked Heather if she wanted to sleep in the back
and Frank said that maybe I should hide out there
too so Heather and I moved back.

There was chilled wine in the refrigerator and
I fell out listening to San Francisco rock and roll-
ing north to freedom. I could feel Heather thinking
so I called to her.

- Are you asleep?

~ No. I'm too excited. When will we reach San
Jose?

- Soon. I want to thank you for helping free me.

- Oh that's OK. It was fun.

I stood leaning my arms on her bunk; she lay
her head on the pillow and we had a long adult
rap. She explained how they had made two week-
end trips to San Luis for dry runs. She handed
me a round thin beveled sand-dollar disk with five
leaves.

- Would you like this for a souvenir?

-- Thanks; I'll take it to^nywife. Do you know
what the five leaves mean?

- Yes.

Heather was looking out the front window:

- What do you see?

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 131

- I see a sign saying SOLEDAD PRISON NEXT
EXIT.

After a while Heather whistled.

- What do you see?

- The sign said San Jose. We're beyond road-
blocks now.

We shook hands smiling.

- This was more exciting than any TV show.
Soon we're roUing along the freeway past the

San Francisco Airport like any homecoming past
Candlestick Park, up the ramps to the Bay Bridge
across to Oakland.

It was three o'clock in the morning when the
camper pulled up to a duplex in the slums of
North Oakland. TTie pad glittered with psychedelic
lights, the Stones were rolling on tape. Kelly and
Maru grinning. First thing was a hot bath. My
elbows and knees were starting to ache and my
body was stiff, exhaustion coming on. Maru
dumped bath oil in a steaming tub and sat on the
bowl laughing while I soaked and told her the
story of the high wire. Next came the kitchen.
Scrambled eggs and bacon and cheeses, milk,
juices. For first time in seven months my stomach
opened up to free food. My legs and arms were
throbbing sore when I lay down on the mattress
and fell into free sleep.

Maru opened the curtains at nine thirty, flood-
ing the room with light. How good to see a beauti-
ful woman in the morning. Time to move. My
suitcase with straight McMillan clothes was
packed. Kelly started pasting a trim moustache
over my lip.

- For security weVe parked the trailer two
blocks away. Frank will be waiting for you. Kelly
and I will catch up with you by sundown when
we rendezvous with Bemadine,

We embraced. Suitcase in hand, I stepped out
in the bright California morning sunshine. It felt
strange bouncing along public streets on limpy
legs.

My heart sang and moustache flapped merrily
loose in the breeze. Kids playing hopscotch
watched curious as I stopped to press the stubble
tape against my right lip. I turned the comer and
saw Frank leaning against the camper. A man
washing his car grinned as I stopped to press back
the flapping left moustache. Frank tossed my suit-
case in the rear. We both climbed in the cab and
rolled out east on Highway 40. Frank watched me
struggling with the moustache, smiling.

- Now that we're out of the traffic you can rip
thatoflf.

134 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

It was all normal. Two fishermen heading out
for the high Rockies. Beyond Richmond the high-
way rolled down into the Sacramento Valley past
a sign California Medical Facility Vacaville, I
looked over the green fields to the metal wire
fence and gray dungeon cellblocks.

I shuddered seeing the guard in the gun tower.

- In the center of that prison there is a cell-
block for the most violent men in the State. They
are kept in cages with walkways above so it is pos-
sible for guards to stroll around and look down
into the pits. There is no furniture in those cells
except a drain-hole toilet. When the men go out
guards carrying clubs surround them.

After Sacramento, I drove.

- Pig patrol car coming up on rear, said Frank.
The rear mirror's full of high-antenna-waving

dome hght, black and white. CALIFORNIA STATE
HIGHWAY PATROL. As it passed the pigs looked
us over and sped away on rubber wheels.

Easy routine developed. For food-fuel stops I
rested safe behind the camper's curtains, leaning
against the sink in the middle of a Reno, Nevada,
shopping center parking lot, sipping tea from a
ceramic mug, reading Rap Brown. Frank was tell-
ing me the history of the Weathermen roller skat-
ing through the convention halls of radical debates
their burnt flower eyes scraping dust from Trots-
kied rhetorical molds and the marbled busts of
revolutionary piety. No student of American poli-
tics could fail to see the inevitable uprising of this
revolutionary tribe of young psychedelic activists,
political mutants of the first television-Einstein-
multidimensional-simultaneous-immediate-energy

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 135

generation. All the power dials were turned on.
Jet streams across eyes of blue acid, crackling
transistorized erotic charges sweeping through the
high-school corridors turning on fourteen-year-
olds (whose information input is greater in one
week than Grandfather's in a lifetime). Wise
ancient children, the smartest, best endowed,
healthiest. Time's sweet pollen laughing answer to
the lethal pressure of computerized machines.
Blow up the wire-tapped, red-hne, wire-tentacled
computer. "The pump won't work 'cause the Van-
dals took the handles."

Frank described Bemadine Dohm the Weather-
woman driving her motorcyple up the marble
steps, her graduation gown cut mini to receive her
law diploma. The flashy-leg child witch of the
Revolution.

Was it days or nights we drove alternating? It
was dawn when we crossed the Mississippi at St.
Louis tired but smiling, drinking beer and dancing
all night at the truck-stop cafe. At sunset Frank
found the sign to Rendezvous National Forest and
pulled the truck up a dirt road to some picnic
tables. Two girls were sitting on a log playing a
flute and guitar. Smoking grass.

Kelly and Maru. We smoked and laughed. One
of those perfect moments under the pine trees in
the hidden forest. Frank came out of the camper
with a whiskey bottle after a big slug said Whew!
Since Saturday night he had carried the load of
escape. He had delivered the fugitive to the ap-
pointed spot where we awaited Bernadine Dohm
and the leaders of the Weathermen Underground.
He went into the camper to fry a steak.

136 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

A pickup truck came along the road and pulled
into the clearing. Two men walked toward us like
Robert Redford and JefF Hunter, turret- jawed
heroes selected on the basis of keen living habits
to play the Che Guevaras in Hollywood. With
them was a beautiful girl. She had a long tidy
pageboy. She dressed like no one else in the out
crowd. Cashmere sweaters, black Capezio flats.
She dated the conventional types, trashers, bomb-
ers, dope-smoking poets.

There was great joy among us as we smoked
and talked. We discussed the plan. We were to
spend the night in a mountain camp. But first
Bernadine, Bob, and Jeff had to visit the Indians
for permission. They would return by ten and
climb the mountain.

The three Graces drove off taking the high
energy with them leaving the forest glade cold,
damp, fearful.

\^nio was the girl, I asked, so staringly attractive.
But even then there was something sensual about
her. Something older, more womanly. Kelly and
Maru laughed delightedly.

- You mean you didn't recognize her? Berna-
dine Dohrn herself? High-school treasurer of the
modern dance class to say nothing of Tumbhng,
Pep Club, Quill and Scroll Journalism Society,
Prom Court, Youth Council, Tower Club. She's the
rah-rah leader of the crazy motherfuckers from
the Girls Athletic Association running down the
aisles of American Airlines borrowing food from
people's plates. Worst of all there's her unforget-
table sex appeal. She has the most amazing legs.
Penny a cocker spaniel completes the family. The

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 137

FBI posters will give you her height (5' 5")> weight
(125), build (provocateur), and breathless details
about her social security number. But that is all
they can tell you. I can tell you Bemadine took the
Sunshine with Her when She left me in the dark
car Ustening to radio rock.

My prison clothes had been found in a service
station near L.A. suggesting that the fugitive was
heading for Mexico. The FBI had been called in
on the case. We listened to a tape of Prison Cap-
tain Koffman's voice glum and bureaucrat play-
ing down the escape. He just strolled out of the
minimum security prison he did. Just hopped the
fence hke missing bed check at summer camp.

I was nervous. Should I hide in the woods?
Kelly was tapping her hands to the Grateful Dead.
Their confidence in the power of good vibrations
warmed the air. Trust the young.

Bernadine, Bob, and Jeff returned with good
news. The Indians had given permission to use
the mountain camp. They knew I was a fugitive
from the paleface law.

I climbed into the pickup truck and we bumped
happy up the mountain road. Who are these
Weathermen who move so freely in and out of
every youth scene in this country? They are not
in hiding but are invisible. If you want to find
them, this is where they are. In every tribe, com-
mune, dormitory, farmhouse, barracks, and town
house where kids are making love, smoking dope,
preparing for the future. Bemadin^ was rapping
about the Weathermen trip. - We fucked up a lot
anyway. We didn't fight around Bobby Scale when
he was shackled at the Conspiracy trial. Four con-

138 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

secutive years we won the trophy for the best
Homecoming float. Everything that everyone else
debated about the Weathermen being tired, having
abolished monogamy, invading high schools and
tying up teachers to show teen-agers how simple
it was, and, of course, dropping acid in communes
to test the center: daze of rage and rites of love.

One terrible climactic day in March, three dear
Weather souls were blown to pieces in a Greenwich
Village town house. That forever destroyed our
belief that armed struggle is the only real revolu-
tionary struggle. Ifs a spiritual revolution.

Bernadine's serious eyes met mine understand-
ing. It was what I was waiting to hear.

- The revolution is totally new, seven libera-
tions: genetic; neurological; sexual; cultural; eco-
nomic; political; and armed struggle only when it
is forced upon us.

I do not see the Weathermen as violent. They
violate no life. They dig human Ufe. They realize
that love is the key to the revolution. They live the
new life-style! The political strategies are being
expanded. The models and philosophies are not
tired Bakunin, Trotsky, Marxist dogmas. The
American Indians are one model. Living in the
mountains close to land. Sitting around the coun-
cil fire. Smoking up the peace pipe. Watching the
white machinery destroy itself.

The truck passed some cabins with chimneys
smoking. A brown-skinned man in a hunting
jacket and long black hair waved.

- He's the Chief, said Jeff.

Near the mountaintop the road ran into a clear-
ing. We jumped out and walked along a path into

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 139

the forest. After ten minutes we could see a fire
ahead and the trail that led down into camp. A
tall hippie sylvan kind, long hair, beard, and warm
smile, was standing by the tree. It was a classic
elvan commune scene. Stone fireplace circled by
logs. Rough board kitchen table. Tents. From the
shadow came this woman, forest dressed and smil-
ing. I felt at home.

We sat around the campfire like fugitives have
always done, flames flickering on outlaw faces,
laughing, retelling recent escapades. Safe in forest
rendezvous, rejoicing, celebrating the reunion
once again of the ancient brotherhood and sister-
hood, l^moking, drinking mint tea.

We walked back to the truck, unloaded sleeping
bags, and spread out in a deep-grass meadow.
Scorpio hung brilhant above in the clear star sky,
wind in the pine trees, earth beneath our bodies.
This is the way to escape.

After breakfast we hiked up the ridge to a peak
panorama and sat on a giant log, high, looking
down with mountain vision on space machines
gouging green earth, throbbing power centers,
tubular pneumatic fists smashing fragile cobweb
flower bodies up endless moving escalators of pris-
oner conveyors and the war goes on and on. Here
in sunshine on the guerrilla mountaintop we made
our plans.

- What do you want to do? Where do you want
to go?

140 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

- If you can usejas here well stay underground
in America.

- You're too hot. You should leave the country.
Maybe to Algeria to join the Brothers.

- Where are the Panthers really?
Thoughtful glances.

- Who knows. On the run. Under the gun.
Fucking up. Holding on. Learning, we hope. They
say they want a popular front with whites and
browns and reds and technicolor kids. They see the
old structure crumbhng. They sense the change.
Like everyone else they want to channel it their
way. Who can blame ihem? They say they want
to work with white kids. Maybe they want to use
us. They're under pressure from everyone. They
say they are nonracists, internationalists. They
publicly back every antisystem group. Huey New-
ton and Eldridge Cleaver have supported long
hair, dope, new life-style, women's Ub.

They insist they are the vanguard. The coming
few months will tell a lot. Huey Newton has called
a constitutional convention in Philadelphia. That
sounds good. Huey calls himself Supreme Com-
mander. That sounds bad. Eldridge Cleaver is
always a ruthless enigma. There is only one way to
find out where the Panthers are. Go to Algeria and
try to turn Cleaver on. Well come and join you.
We'll have to get approval from Huey and Cleaver.
The problem is : for security and secrecy we can't
contact them until you are out of the country.
There are too many informers in their group. Go to
Algeria quietly with a false ID and then contact
Cleaver. Well send people to see the Supreme Com-
mander here.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 141

- We'll figure out how you split the country
when we get to Salt Lake. Let us spend today
turning on together.

I was not centered. My knees ached swollen
and I yearned to be with Her. I was still jumping
with prison security reflex. The Weathermen, con-
fident after eight months of heterosexual under-
ground, radiated serenity.

Bob smiled.

- You will always look back on this day in the
sunshine.

We walked along the ridge. Down below two
hawks floated over the valley. We stood watching
as they rode air currents up and circled back
closer closer ten feet above our heads.

Lunch around the campfire. Organic flour pan-
cakes. Fresh vegetables. Steaming soup. Tender
good-byes to our forest hosts. For ten years jvejhad
seen the underground network form in the com-
munes. We had ridden with the dealers and talked
over tepee fires with the new tribes. Now the out-
law guerrillas were learning how to swim hke fish
through counterculture urban pads, college-town
collectives, surfer beach cottages, mountain com-
munes. The Weathermen were recreating the orig-
inal nose-thumbing, independent free American
life-style. I was happy to be with them.

We drove down the trail to the Indian camp.
The Chief welcomed us formally. His face was
solemn but his eyes shone affection for the
Weathermen. We sat around his wooden table.
His wife brought beans and a meat stew. There
were animal skins and rifles on the wall. Drinking
coffee and puffing with deep thoughtful pleasure

142 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

from a cigarette, the Chief spoke quietly of the
prophecies. That the white machine men would
destroy themselves with greed. That the Indians
would persevere and preserve the earth. That a
young generation of whites would let their hair
grow and return to the tribal wisdom and the
brotherhood of all wild animals. He blessed me
wdth his handshake; his left arm on my right
shoulder.

Frank was waiting in the National Forest at
sunset. Farewell to the Weathermen. See you in
three days. I climbed into the truck and we con-
tinued the journey east. By midnight we were just
hours out of Durango. I was eager to press on.
Frank was businesslike. We are supposed to ren-
dezvous at a highway camp tomorrow dawn. I
slept fitfully. Aching knees woke me when I tossed
and turned.

We cooked bacon and eggs in the camper, door
closed, window curtains drawn. Frank kept peer-
ing out looking for the contacts. It's always nervous
when you're late in the underground. I was churn-
ing to get on the move. I was worried that the
people parked next to us on the beach the night of
the escape could have copied the license plate
number. Frank remained cheerful.

- Good. There they are.

I could see Frank laughing and back slapping
with three Mexicans in front of the campsite toi-
lets. They handed Frank a brown manila folder.
He gave them an envelope and a handful of
money.

It was ten in the morning and the sun half high
in the sky when we started. My eagerness made it

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 143

a slower drive through the used-car-lot suburbs of
Dallas. We inched through downtown traffic and
left the city southwest. In a half hour we were out
in the country again.

- Not far now said Fr^ik.

We turned off the highway on to a side road and
drove past irrigated and well-tended farmlands. We
crossed a stream bridge into a wide valley.

- The house is about a mile ahead. Fm going to
drive past it. There'll be a sign in the window if it's
cool. Then 111 drop you off down the road. We
don't want anyone to connect the camper to the
ranch.

The old farmhouse was set back quarter of
mile from the road. Orange curtains in the front
window.

- All's cool said Frank.

The road curved east beyond the ranch. Frank
braked the camper and waved to the door. We
shook hands. I grabbed my suitcase and jumped
down.

- I'm going to hide the camper and rendezvous
with Maru and Kelly.

I started walking along the deserted country
road. Fast. I wanted to run. When I got to the
entrance to the farm road I saw a redheaded girl
open the door and come down the stairs looking
and waving at me. She ran back to the house.
Then the door opened and She ran down the steps
and started walking toward me. I was walking

144 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

easier. Then we both began to run. It was one of
the best scenes ever. We were running toward
each other laughing and ghe threw her arms
around me and I lifted her, swinging her around,
and held her close and we were in our arms. Home
again.

10

SHE: Monday we had breakfast in the hotel
room. A knock at the door and a tall gangly kid
loped into the room.

Pam said, - Jerry always gets freaked when he
has to come above ground in a hotel like this. He's
afraid he'll meet his father.

We packed and just before leaving the room
Jerry went into the bathroom and took the bars of
soap.

An old battered pickup truck was parked across
the street.

- That must be ours, I said.

First to an import place where I spent $150 on
beautiful things for your homecoming. I bought
orange Japanese lanterns that would have looked
perfect on that naked bulb in our room, but they
got lost somewhere. Anyway I got orange bed
sheets from India. Color of sunshine, two orange
pillows, incense, candles, Tuberg beer and Chilean
and Portuguese wine, Danish cheeses, Holland
cheeses, smoked oysters, artichoke hearts. Then
we stopped at a health-food store and I drank
some carrot juice and bought more food. Then
we stopped at a supermarket and bought some
Kleenex and a carton of Camels. Then we stopped
at a fruit stand and headed out to the farm.

146 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

A I was a little shocked to see that the ranch
house had neighbors right next door but every-
/thing else was sunny. Jerry baked bread and we
went out and picked apples, berries, plums.

Then Pam showed me the lake. It was so beauti-
ful and fresh. - We've got to build a wickiup for
steam bathing.

I found just the spot for it. On the way back we
found a forest clearing all mossy meadow and we
fell down in the sun and breathed deeply. Under-
ground with the Weatherman.

How many days did I wait for you there? It
seemed like two weeks. Fixed up our room and
baked bread and cooked meals and picked berries
and apples. By the next day I was bored longing
for you. I started looking out the second floor
window at the road. You weren't expected until
tomorrow but I could feel anticipation stirring.

Around three in the afternoon I started to ex-
pect something to happen. I was in the bedroom
and saw a camper drive by and although I'd seen
many such vehicles I was struck by the thought
that you were in it.

Pam called to me as I came downstairs. - I
think they just went by.
/ - I think so too. Did you recognize anyone?

- No. I just had a feeling.

Then I saw you running toward the house. I
asked Pam, - Can I go to him and she said - Sure.
\ What a scene I The old screen door slammed be-
hind me and I went down the stairs two at a time.
And I ran toward you with aU my strength to be in
( your arms once again.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 147

Mounting the creaky worn wood steps through
the big farm kitchen leaping upstairs to the bed-
room. In bed loving, laughing, at long last. Sitting
on the bed. Beaming. Tell me everything. Getting
high. Detailing flight, laughing. We hear voices
below and call come up. The room filled with Pam
and Kelly and Maru and Frank smiling in the
comer. Smoking. Celebration.

Champagne corks popping, tape machine play-
ing songs unheard in prison, fruit, homemade
bread, reclining couches, almond-eyed houris, ca-
ressing, sweet, smooth camembert cheese, hearing
cars swishing by on road below, I gotta girl way ^
over town so good to me. The paint peeling off
ceiling and waUboard broken wooden beams gap-
ing. Cars on highway below.

Wine, grass, cheese, smoked oysters, incense,
perfume, candlelight, and love. I hadn't slept
sweet in seven months, running for three days,
swollen knees, throbbing muscles, stiff sweet lips.
Love is good.

Tuesday we walked by the lake. She led me
within a thick grove of low aspens, slenHer trunks
were bent and tied to make a bathhouse. We sat
on the sandy floor scraping earth smooth and
piling rocks.

~ You love to play house.

Kneeling she looks up pushing her hair back
laughing.

148 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

~ Listen. What's that noise?

- A boat motor on the lake.

We were redskins crouching low in the bushes
watching ranger uniforms slide by.

- Whitemen. Uniforms. The enemy.

We lay in the sand dune while gulls from Great
Salt Lake wheeled above. At sunset the farmhouse
burst open to the entrance of the Weathermen
chiefs, sexy guerrilla heroes. Bernadine, Robert,
and Jeff. Rolling it. The tape machine singing.
They were waving stories of Weathermen Under-
ground Help Prison Escape. Photocopy of the man-
ifestos with kid gloves flown to L.A. mailed special
delivery in plain envelopes to newspapers. J. Edgar
Hoover promised that the FBI would capture the
fugitives in ten days.

A family love reunion with the Weatherpeople,
cooking dinner, drinking red wine, smoking, re-
viewing plans for splitting the country. Under-
ground radio stations New York, San Francisco,
college stations were broadcasting the escape state-
ment and there was great joy among the tribes.

I had spent two hundred nights lying in prison
bunks working out two hundred surefire plans for
flight out of the country. A hehcopter to a deserted
Mexican road, a drive to Veracruz rent a boat to
Cuba. Sail to Easter Island.

- It's really not that complicated. Let's use a
simple plan. We're having a set of IDs made here.
Use a faraway city address. Tucson, Arizona, or
Atlanta, Georgia. Friday you go down and get a
Utah state driver's hcense. There won't be time for
a picture but your description will be on the tem-
porary license. Sunday you fly to New York. Mon-

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 149

day apply for a passport. You can ^et it in a day.
Monday night you fly to the Third World. Surface
with Eldridge Cleaver in Algeria.

I was astonished. I never thought of carrying
my face into a passport office crowded with feds
and asking humbly for a passport. Or standing in
an airport line to board an international flight? Ah,
Professor, going to Algeria I see. Have a good trip.

It was September 1970. The Palestinians were
ripping off planes to free their brethren from
prison. At no time in the history of aeronau-
tics was there more surveillance of international
flights. And to an Arab country? Take a one-day-
old passport past the metal detector and the sharp-
eyed experts carefully checking each face for
hijack tremors?

I could imagine the flash of recognition on FBI
faces. Plainclothes detectives moving in and the
click of wrist chains. %^^

/'^ Give me a rowboat to Cuba. I'll gladly hijack\
a plane to Hanoi. Let's do it with flourish. But not J
into a tourist trap. ^

Bernadine grins understanding.

- Let's meditate on it and see what it looks like
tomorrow.

We sit around the kitchen table reading news-
paper seriahzations of the life and death of a
Weathergirl. It was heavy weather to read the
vulgar syndicated version of a beloved sister.

- The town-house explosion really made us

150 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

Stop and think. We had been swept up on the vio-
lence trip. Went to the edge of the abyss of armed
revolution and peered in. The big question. When
and how consciously you will use force to preserve
your life? Siva's rugged yoga of divine destruction?
Buddhist kamikaze detachment? The Gita's calm
unblinking endorsement of consciously applied
force? Captain Galley. Vietnam. Kent State. Man-
son. America's violence-prone.

The Weathermen simply sing the song of DNA:
defend your home, protect your territory. The
peace-loving Weathermen blow up war machines,
lethal buildings, destroy the deadly things that
threaten hving people. The war is against the ma-
chine. To the American middle class, destruction
of property is violence. The killing of Blacks is not
violent. Prison had taught me the hj^ocrisy about
guns. Every American is protected by arms. There
is no piece of land in the world not under the pro-
tective surveillance of someone's guns.

The Weathermen Underground lives indepen-
dent of American military and poHce guns. They
are outlaws. They cannot call American police for
aid. They consciously choose to protect themselves
and to accept the protection of other guns. Rebel
guns.

- Apply for a passport or hijack a plane?

- Let's postpone the decision and work on a
disguise. If we come up with a good face change,
my courage will mount.

What disguise? A beard? A moustache? Pad
your weight? Makeup with scar? Brown skin?
Blond hair? Dress in drag? Become an old man of
eighty? Become a young man of twenty-five?

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 151

TheyTl be looking for me to dress up or hide be-
hind a beard. The strategy is to take it off.

- Take off what?

- Take off my hair. Bald. - Who's the barber?

- Kelly.

I sat stripped to the waist in a kitchen chair
while Kelly trimmed the back sides to an American
Legion butch. She looked sadly at the scissors in
her hand, brushing her long tresses away from her
eyes.

- I just hate to do this.

Kelly snipping my top hair close to the scalp. It
was a slow process. Kelly is a gigghng artist. Stand-
ing back studying her work.

- Not bad. Now let's shave it clean.

Kelly drapes a hot rag on my skull and squirts
lather foam. Carefully she starts to shave.

-- Take it easy, bloody gashes will betray.

Easy gentle little strokes. After while Kelly be-
gins to laugh. I walk to the bathroom and peer
in the mirror at a high-domed, chicken-plucked
moose-faced baldpate stranger.

When Bernadine, Bob, and Jeff return they
gaped at the change. For the first time I feel a
flicker of feasibility.

SHE : Tim went into the bathroom to look at him- 1
selTand came out smihng.

- Well let's go. I've waited for seven months to
see that Woodstock movie. Bernadine dug the
idea.

- It will be a good test for your disguise.

The first pubhc appearance. We walked past
theater guards, bought two tickets, two bags of

152 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

hot buttered popcorn, ice-cream bars and walked
down the welcome darkness to hear Richie Havens
singing FREEDOM! FREEDOM!

We found seats near the front and opened our
eyes to the bright silver screen for it's a home movie
and Tim kept shouting: - There's Mike! There's
Hugh! And I kept shushing him. We were really
quite pubhc, our commando group behind us ex-
changing loud comments and cries of pleasure.
It must have looked funny a bald-headed man,
a virgin secretary, and three young Hollywood
actors.

We jumped with Santana and sorrowed with
Jimi at the long sad ending. Jimi died the night
before.

As we crossed the street after the show we saw
a narc waiting on the corner. He glanced at us as
we walked by.

Back in the car Tim said, - Now for some plas-
/ tic goodies at a drive-in. He ordered enormous
piles of cheeseburgers, malteds, and french fries.
After seven months I was ready to freak out too.
As we drove back to the farm Bob kept his head
turned half to talk to us and half to watch the cars
behind us.

Saturday morning was cloudy.

A tribal council meeting around the kitchen
table. The baldhead disguise and last night's trial
run gave me courage. It's still the riskiest plan but
now I see it can be done. - What ID do I need to
get a passport.

Bob and Jeff began spilling jigsaw pieces of
identities over the table. - Here's your prison

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 153

escape ID. That would have been ideal except that
he's already got a passport and he's heavily
bearded. Here's another set. A beautiful one with
driver's license and all. But the picture blows it. I
don't see any way to avoid your getting a driver's
license with your own picture on it. That means
we'll have to wait till Monday. Then fly to Detroit
Monday night. Get a passport Tuesday morning.
Hit it for Madrid Tuesday night. If we're going to
do that here's the best ID.

Bob pushed a set of cards across the table.

- Birth certificate. William John McMillan
again. November 14, 1929. Scorpio. Social Se-
curity card. Temporary driver's license with no
description.

- The birth certificate gets you the driver's li-
cense. And the two get you a passport.

The Weathermen were ready for a day of con-
templation but I'm a McMillan businessman.

- We've got to buy clothes today.

- Well get them tomorrow.

- Tomorrow is Sunday. Get them today. Well
build a peyote shrine by the lake. We spent the
afternoon hauling stones and piling firewood. At
sunset we headed back to the farmhouse but the
Weathermen were tied up in the city.

A rainy Sunday.

~ Shall we go on the same plane?
~ You could go to Detroit tomorrow with Pam
and take the plane to Madrid Monday. Ill meet

154 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

you there Wednesday morning. That would be
safer for you. Jour disguise is so perfect there's no
chance you'll be detected.

- My life is in your hands. Fll do whatever you
want.

- There is more chance that Til be captured. I
want you to be free.

- What if Fm in Madrid and you're captured?
I want to be with you.

Fog-damp morning poured through a window
hole. Our projectors were set for fast speed, hurry
movements. Have a quick cup of instant coffee.
Pack a bag of wrinkled soiled nerve endings.
Smoke to slow it down. It's like loving. There's no
need to hurry.

Mary Margaret McCreedy, recent graduate of
Moore's Business School, patted her short-curled
bubble head with shy gesture, brushed her modest
dress, wriggled, giggled, walked down to the
I kitchen followed by the sober brown of Wilham
John McMillan, his American Legion bald pate
gleaming in the morning light of Bob and Berna-
dine's surprise.

- Those are perfect disguises. They'll never rec-
ognize you.

We trunk the suitcase and cHmb in the rent-a-
car. Bernadine drives. Bob leaning back explain-
ing how to build up a social identity.

- First we go to the hcense bureau. You take the

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 155

written test and the road test. Then we go to the
library and get you a card. Then a fishing license.
Pam will buy the airline tickets. Then we jam it to
the airport.

I stood in line at motor vehicles reading the
traffic rulebook. Bad news. No chance for a test
today. We have to make an appointment in ad-
vance. I tell the news to the group in the car. It
didn't bring Bob down. He never takes low for an
answer.

- Let's try another office.

We check the pay-phone directory. We drive to a
suburban office. No appointments today.

- Look. Just go back there and lay a heavy rap
on them. About how you have to have it today
because you're leaving town or something.

- That doesn't feel right. The story is too ffimsy.
-- You could fly back to Nevada tonight and pick

up a license there.

- No, we're on the move now. Let's pick up the
fishing license and the library card and aim for
Detroit on schedule. If we run into identification
problems there, we'll deal with them. We'U get
that Protestant minister to come down to the pass-
port office to vouch for me or as last resort Pam
can do it.

Down in the funky tenderloin of town, next to
the fortune-tellers, pawnshops, gin mills we find a
passport photo store. I sit in the adjustable chair
arranging facial muscles so that bright hght hur-
tling from flood lamps at the speed of 186,000
miles per second reflects from my mouth corner
depressions, labial tensities, ocular worry wrin-

156 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

kles, stern, grim lifeless lunar frowns, all glancing
off my spectacles.

I return in an hour and behold the invisible
square American. Would you buy a lid from this
man? Would you drop acid with this man?

We picked up Bemadine and Her in front of a
department store with new luggage engraved W. J.
McMillan.

Hit it for the airport.

Underground with Weathermen in the skyroom
restaurant. Champagne cocktails. Boeing engines
whining. High, excited, swept up in the jet blast
of our own acceleration. The slow cloudy days of
indecision behind us. We were on the move.

She and Pam unloaded their bags in front of the
airport. Bernadine and Bob drove me to the park-
ing lot.

- We'll say good-bye to you here, you go ahead
and check in to the flight. We'll follow in a minute
to observe and see it all goes well.

- We love you.

- Well meet again soon.

Mr. William J. McMillan walked with careful
dignity to the ticket counter, his horn-rimmed
glasses reflecting that sincere serious no hanky-
panky slightly worried face of a responsible busi-
nessman. Down the terminal corridors to the gate
counter onto the first-class section of the plane.
Scotch and soda, Time magazine with fdet mignon.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 157

At the bagsjage counter Mr. McMillan was ap-
proached by two nice chattering secretary girls
who accompany him in a limousine to the Airport
Motel.

Miss Mary Margaret McCreedy — for it is she —
seems to find the Detroit climate sultry. She com-
plains about the heat.

McMillan and McCreedy blithely disregarding
the imminence of early wake-up take advantage of
this fortuitous meeting at the airport to renew an
old acquaintance which obviously calls for cham-
pagne. Champagne in celebration of the last eve-
ning on the soil of their birthland before flight into
political exile.

Pam and I drove in the early rainy mom to the
city and found Kelly sitting in a coffeehouse next
to a khaki bag bulging with smiles, hundred-
dollar bills, delighted stories about escape reac-
tions, and copies of underground papers.

A nice Detroit pohceman directed us to the
Federal Building. I recalled coming to testify for
John Sinclair and the Seven in Judge Hoffman's
court as Pam guided me up the elevator to the door
of the U.S. STATE DEPARTMENT PASSPORT
DIVISION.

The room was crowded. Pam slid to the counter
and brought forms to the writing tables. I puUed
out the ID cards and paper with my personal his-
tory. My name and birth date. Now create a
father's name and date and invent a mother's
name and date and a wife named Sylvia and two
lovely children. From the wall the face of Richard

158 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

Nixon observed every false move. High be his
title, proud his name, he watched helpless as I
stood in line behind two middle-aged Hungarians
in bureaucratic trouble. The clerk, a round-faced
plump Irish matron explained patiently and firmly,
pointing to the rules with her pencil. Next two old
Italians breaking English words to explain their
passports had been lost in the mail. My Aunt
Bridget shook her head in sympathy and helped
slowly fill out the form.

A large sign above the counter listed the require-
ments for a passport. Birth certificate. OK. Photos.
OK. Personal identification with picture. That's the
problem. As Itahans moved away I stood in front
of my kinswoman. I flashed a slight smile of
understanding. Youll have no bureaucratic trouble
from W. J. McMillan, a fine upstanding Catholic
businessman with two lovely children.

Her eyes twinkled. Birth certificate. That's fine,
Mr. McMillan. Personal ID? Driver's license? No.
I'm afraid I don't drive. WiU Social Security card
do? She frowned in concern. No it has to have
your picture or identification. Pam getting ready to
move in to offer voucher.

- Ah, I do have something here.

Aunt Bridget took my hunting license in her
plump hand while Pam and I showered positive
radiation.

- Yes Mr. McMillan, I can accept this. It has
your description, well, it doesn't have your hair
and eye color but I can see your Irish eyes smiling
and your hair, dear man, the less said the better.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 159

You or your friend can pick up your passport in
three hours at the counter over there.

We walked out to the hallway where I lifted
Pam and swung her around triumphant.

I bought a Michehn guide to Madrid, phoned
jier, the good news, and took a cab to the motel.

The plane was to leave for Madrid at 5 : 30 and
we had to be at the airport at 4:30. At 4:00 I
said they should be here by now, walked to the
window to create a reality, looked down to see
Pam and Kelly leaping out of the cab. They breezed
into the hotel room flashing the ink-wet passport,
airhne ticket, and an opaque bottle of shave lotion
hastily filled with the juice of Quick Silver. We
grabbed our bags and flagged a cab, writing my
signature in the passport in back seat.

The taxi driver unloads bags as the airport
guards watch. Miss McCreedy shakes hands and
thanks me for the ride to the airport and goes off
with one of my bags. To waste time I kneel on the
sidewalk stuffing the bottle in the remaining suit-
case. Pam returns with my bag whispering loudly.

- Don't stay out here, there are all sorts of pigs
watching you.

Directly in front of me in the terminal I see
Miss McCreedy checking into TWA. I put bags
down and watch intently until I realize that this
is suspicious. Several men seated are also intently
watching. Hijack surveillance agents scrutinize
all passengers with personality profiles.

Quarter to five. Forty-five minutes to go. I pre-
tend to make a phone call. Smoking in the waiting
room.

160 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

At five o'clock I walk around to the TWA
counter, request a window seat to Spain, inquire
about the movie, smile patiently at the overworked
clerk.

Carrying two pocket guides to Spain I walk
slowly to the gates. Alarm vibrations. A big crowd
has clustered. Four plainclothes agents standing
in the runway search handbags, frisk clothes, run
metal detectors. Moving forward I see Pam and
McCreedy standing watching. They are supposed
to board first. I move steadily into line behind a
young Iranian couple. As the Arab faces reach the
inspection table four suspicious snouts approach.
They were trying to beat the overweight baggage
allowance by stuffing toilet articles and gifts in
the bottom of carry-on suit containers. The four
inspectors new on job are alerted by Islamic faces.
Two FBI inspectors with badges behind the rail-
ing make the agents doubly nervous. The jittery
scene relaxed me. I flash a patient **What-a-fuck-
up" frown at the head FBI. He said apologetically,
- I'm sorry-to-inconvenience-you, sir. Four search
agents feel my stern critique of their bungling.

As the frightened Arabs are waved through I
step to the inspection table, send a stern look of
Let's-get-back-to-normal-you-enlisted-men.

Eight eyes see I had no hand baggage. The first
agent asks me to open my coat. He eyeballs for
weapons. No need to pat me down. I wait patiently
while two agents kneel to adjust dials of the large
door-frame metal detector.

With mildly exaggerated longstep I moved
through the scientifically calibrated law-enforce-
ment gates, glanced back at six police and the

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 161

smiling face of Miss Mary Margaret McCreedy
following me.

Miss Silly and Miss Pam at the flight counter. \

Can I still catch the 5 : 30 to Madrid? Marvelous.
My fiance is meeting me. Oh Pam, Tm so excited.
I wish you were going with me. Yes, please make
it round-trip. Will it save money? I'd like a seat
in the smoking section.

I had planned to carry the little bag on with me.
It contains books. Oh I didn't realize it would
require special inspection. Thanks for not charg-
ing me overweight. I'll send it as baggage.

Mr. McMillan walks up behind us.

In the bookstore I buy The Godfather while
Weathergirl Pam steals a book of poetry. The
boarding gate was jammed with agents inspecting
hand luggage.

- Good-bye sister. We love you.

- We did it all for love.
I watch my man McMillan walking down the i

ramp past metal detectors. Four pigs surround
me. Examine my purse. One winks. I walk through
vibrating poles through the accordion-pleated cat-
erpillar tunnel to the smiling stewardess.

I walk past Mr. McMillan who glances up from
his magazine and winks.

From the tourist class seat I watch Miss
McCreedy picking her way down the aisle. A long
long wait for the cabin door to close. The stew-

162 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

ardess running back and forth. Twice a top pig
with big federal badge walked peering through
plane.

Fm strapped in a seat belt watching rerun in-
flight movies.

The nuclear physicist flees Nazi Germany un-
dercover while Storm Troopers search airport. A
Russian poet ditches police escort and hops a
plane for freedom. It's the last flight from Singa-
pore before the enemy closes the airfield.

The cabin door up front slams closed, engines
begin to whine higher and louder. Slowly the left
wing swings serenely, picks up speed, and the
plane lumbers to the runway. A calm voice in-
structs us to fasten seat belts no smoking and the
giant aluminum-winged tube lurches, turns the
corner, hesitates to gather up force and blast
down the runway. The wheels leave ground.

The stewardess suggests that if the wing seat
blocks view I can move back to the seat directly
opposite Miss McCreedy. Our eyes meet exultant.
We order champagne and looking across the aisle,
we raise our glasses.

11

^e woke as the plane started the sunrise de-
scent to Madrid. It was a picture album moment
to remember, touching the soil of Europe. It was a
coming home. Tracing the ancestor seed line back.
America is a genetic experiment on the part of
Europe, Asia, and Africa. We were high on free-
dom and new experience!

We cleared customs smoothly and cabbed to
the Ritz where there was no room. Conventions,
block tours, and an army of Japanese visitors were
jamming the hotels. After three sweaty hours of
futility we decided on a long shot.

For years friends had told us of a Spanish law
professor from one of the best families in Spain
who had expressed great interest in meeting us.
Mario. Mario. What's his last name? We sat in a
cafe flicking mnemonic cards. She remembered.
Mario Villanuova.

There were rows of Villanuovas in the phone
book. Two were doctors. The first caU clicked.

- Dr. Villanuova, my name is Dr. McMillan.
From the Menninger Clinic. I am a friend of
Timothy.

- A friend of his is a friend of mine.

- We have a message from him to you.
Mario insisted that we come at once to his

164 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

home. In the cab we agreed that she would go In
to check the scene. If Mario was OK she could
identify herself.

Mario lived in a mansion surrounded by an iron
fence and formal gardens.^ She left the cab and I
dropped off with the bags at the corner restaurant.
In five minutes sh§ appeared with Mario in a blast
of welcome enthusiasm. He embraced me.

- His study is a Hindu temple, she said, with
San Francisco posters and incense. I looked in his
eyes and told him who we were.

Mario was fifty, young, and leaping around
with joy. His wife Christina was warm, Andalu-
sian, dark, striking. They were aristocratic people
delighted by the adventure ofTiiding us out.
American friends had sent him clippings of our
escapades.

We were shown to a luxurious room. After a
rest, a moment of sharing and a sauna, Mario and
Christina took us to a small but hidden elegant
restaurant. We were old friends before the eve-
ning was over.

Mario and Christina were bored with Madrid
society. They wanted us to stay in Spain. He had
a country house where we could live in isolation.
He could arrange South American passports with
his left connections. It was an intriguing prospect.
But we knew that the Weathermen were waiting
to see if Algeria could work out for us and for
them. So it was decided that I would take a quick
trip to see Eldridge Cleaver and sound out the pos-
sibilities for pohtical asylum. The choice was to
Uve in luxury underground with false passports
or surface in a politically sympathetic country. It

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 165

was a repeat of the prison decision. Escape or
liberation.

I hit the Algiers airport without a visa but the
McMillan businessman aura produced a tempo-
rary entrance card. The JBrst hit of Algiers at night
was depressing. The streets were quiet, no women
were to be seen. I missed JHei:.

The next morning I set out to locate the Pan-
thers. The hotel clerk said try the newspaper. The
editor said try the party. The FLN official said try
the tourist office. The McMillan disguise was too
good for revolutionary contacts.

The telephone girl at the hotel made the con-
nection. She phoned around to some friends and
put me through to the Panther embassy. An Afro-
American voice answered.

- Right on, brother. We've been expecting you.
The cab wound up through the fashionable El

Biar hills to a stately villa. The gate was locked.
The bell was next to a brass plaque etched with
the design of the JBerce Panther.

Eldridge Cleaver was not at the embassy. I was
to be driven to his home later. I spent the day
talking with Cleaver's deputy, the Commander, a
handsome, strong, humorous man. We had many
mutual friends back in Babylon. He recalled that
our first meeting was on a TWA ffight from New
York to San Francisco.

- We were the only ones on the plane. Eldridge
and me and two other brothers. We were getting
paranoid, see. Suspecting an FBI trap. When you
and her got on, we said, sheet, now* they really
are going to ditch this plane.

The other Panthers at the embassy were im-

166 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

pressive, likable heroic men. One had hijacked a
plane to Havana single-handed. Another had es-
caped the pohce raid that busted the New York
Twenty-one by leaping thirty feet from a window
and swinging across rooftops. They were glad to
see me.

At sunset the Commander drove me to the villa
of Eldridge Cleaver. He was at the gate and greeted
me warmly.

- There's a friend of yours waiting inside.

It was Stu Alpert, Yippie leader, underground
guru, disheveled long-haired legend of the Ameri-
can movement. He had been sent by Jerry Rubin
and Abbie Hoffman to prepare the way for us in
Algeria.

Eldridge was pleased by my arrival. He urged
that we join them, assured that he could obtain
political asylum for us. There was much that we
could do together, unify the American Revolution
etc. etc.

Stu Alpert supported the plan. He was to return
to America with good tidings of the grand aUiance,
arrange for more counterculture people to join us
in Algiers. It was a breathtaking perspective. Inter-
racial harmony, high-energy collaboration, a new
society of American exiles. A romantic script
which met our highest aspirations. I kept thinking
of Charhe, Bobby, and WiUie, and Everett; how
happy they would be. And the circle of Black
strength and affection that had protected me in
each of the thirteen jails and prisons I had passed
through. I kept wishing somehow that Kathleen
was here. It seemed off somehow that we were
blueprinting grandiose plans, the three of us, when

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 167

our mates were absent. It had a faint flavor of
prison men talk.

Eldridge and Stu urged that She come at once.
I could dig that. It was an old story. We were
three half creatures spinning out big plans.

Eldridge drove me down to the hotel tenderly
talking of our shared prison past and free future.

I phoned Madrid in a glow and She was ready
to come tomorrow. !^he always answered the call.

She swept radiant Beauty through customs-
immigration convoyed by a fleet of admiring Al-
gerian sub chasers in her plastic wig.

When we arrived at Cleaver's pad^she flipped
off the helmet, red-brown hair falling deep around
her shoulders and offered to turn him oyi. E.G.
freaked. He asked if^he had smuggled any dope
which of course was an unfair accusation. While
we chatted amiably with the genial Commander,
Eldridge busied himself with tape recorders and
record players; listening to headphones while we
played with affectionate memories.

She, was disappointed to find that Kathleen had
not yet returned from North Korea. We had such
great expectations that^She^and Kathleen, if left
free, would produce the proton intersection, the
nuclear energy acceleration which always results
from the connection of two liberated women.

As we were about to leave for the beach hotel
Eldridge began to question us severely about our
sleeping arrangements. He was concerned about
our different passports and the security risk of
our sleeping together illegally. I asked him what
alternative he could suggest. Should we stay in the
embassy? I indicated that after seven months of

168 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

prison separation we were desirous to be together
and that if the Algerian officials were willing to
grant us poUtical asylum they certainly would
excuse our sharing a hotel room with unmarried
passports.

Then and there occurred the conversation that
set the stage.

- I don't want to be your parole officer, said
Eldridge.

- You wouldn't violate me for sleeping with
my wife, would you?

- You can only violate yourself said Eldridge
Cleaver, in the classic rejoinder of the parole
officer.

I think that any prisoner will understand this
conversation. I flashed on the fact that Eldridge
walked from prison as a parolee who had conned
the man (and the woman) with a good story and
no one can fault that. Small technical matters
perhaps, but Huey understands. Such things take
on importance to ex-convicts.

During the next few days we saw much of Stu
and Eldridge. We arranged for our asylum papers.
Kathleen arrived, beautiful but tired and not too
happy. She hated exile and Algeria. She was home-
sick, lonely, and lovely.

We were looking forward, looking forward to
finding a home where Eldridge and Kathleen could
come and be with us.

The Yippie delegation arrived three days before
my birthday. E.G. had arranged it as a surprise
party. Kathleen called and said sarcastically that
our friends were at the airport without visas.

- What friends?

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 169

- Stu Alpert and a band of Yippies.

It was embarrassing for E.G. to have to ^o to
the airport and confer with the officials about spe-
cial entrance passes for a delegation of freaks,
trashers, and bombers. Jennifer Dohrn, Berna-
dine's sister, added fresh charm. Anita Hoffman
provided a dash of elegance. Abbie was waiting in
Rome. The conditions of his appeal bond from
Chicago did not allow him to come to Algeria.

The day before the birthday party an article in
the government paper reported that Algeria had
extended political asylum to an Afro-American
psychologist and his wife who would be working
for the Black Panther party. A press conference
was announced in two days. E.G. leaked to the
press that a Miss Dohrn would also be present.
The assumption was that Weatherwoman chief
Bernadine had joined us in Algeria. It all sounded
mysterious.

The day before the press conference we were
all ordered to leave our hotel rooms and remain
secluded in an apartment guarded by Panthers.
The reason for this restriction to quarters was that
Algiers was ^filling up with newspapermen and
TV crews. The government did not want us to be
seen on the streets.

For the night of October 22 a large cake had
been prepared. On the frosting was written: HAP-
PY BIRTHDAY. TIM'S FREE, FREE BOBBY.
Bobby Scale was also born on October 22. He was
awaiting trial in the New Haven jail. Eldridge led
the group in singing Happy birthday to you, happy
birthday to you, happy birthday dear Tim and
Bobby, happy birthday to you. She had arranged

170 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

with E.G. that I be given a real loaded pistol for
my birthday. E.G. was pleased with the idea. He
deserves a piece, he said, but the gift was post-
poned.

Our little band of celebrants was unaware of
the ripple caused by the bland announcement
about the Afro-American psycholo^st. The news
that notorious drug fugitives had joined Black
Panthers under the protection of a militant revo-
lutionary government was an amusing twist in
the mass of repetitious political news that passed
over editors' desks. The escape from prison and
the flight from the country and the Weathermen
added romantic flavors to the sauce. Algerian em-
bassies were receiving requests for visas from
dope dealers on the run. Algerian diplomats were
questioned about their government's position on
marijuana. The reahties of Algerian pohtics may
have intruded. Our asylum had been arranged by
the FLN, the left political faction of the Algerian
Government. The FLN had less power than the
centrist army, the Foreign Office, and conservative
ministries that deal with economic reconstruction.
At cocktail parties and social gatherings along the
international diplomatic network, the topic of LSD
in Algeria offered possibilities for joking questions.

My Playboy interview bleep about LSD as aphro-
disiac bounced back again. An Algerian journalist
assigned to the United Nations during the week of
our press conference told me that he had been
asked by other journalists and diplomats about
Algeria's erotic bomb capacity. At this point the
FLN canceled the press conference.

Eldridge huddled with the FLN to decide how

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 171

to take the heat off Algjeria as the new pleasure
center. It was decided to send a Hippie- Yippie-
Black Panther-LSD Delegation to Amman, Jordan,
to join Jean Genet in a Grande Conference de
Presse Internationale in support of the Palestinian
guerrillas.

Why did Eldridge invent such a bizarre inter-
national caper? He was reviving with me in Al-
geria an old script he had used in Cuba. The clue
for this nostalgia rerun was provided by Lee Lock-
wood in his book Conversations with Eldridge
Cleaver:

In the first place, Cleaver [Leary] told me he
had chosen Cuba [Algeria] for his place of exile
out of admiration for Fidel Castro [Huey New-
ton], Che Guevara [Eldridge Cleaver], and the
Cuban [Algerian] people, and also because the
Cubans [Algerians] firmly supported other revolu-
tionary movements throughout the world . . .
The Cubans [Algerians] were upset over the
publicity that was being given Cleaver's [Leary's]
presence in Cuba [Algeria]. They wanted him to
fly to Algeria [Lebanon] ... in order to take
the heat off Cuba [Algeria]. He would hold a
press conference in Algiers [Beirut], stay there
for a while, and later on he would be allowed to
return quietly to Havana [Algiers].

E.G. never made it back to Cuba.

We, were uneasy about the separation. The FLN
bought the tickets and we were relieved to notice
that they were round-trip.

Our hotel on the beach was used by the govern-
ment to house Soviet delegations in Algeria and

172 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

we observed the regimentation. The Russians,
dressed alike in 1930 business suits, would march
double-file across the village square to the restau-
rant, eat the same meal, and rise in unison at the
sign from the leader.

Although I was the paper leader of our delega-
tion, the Commander, stern and businesslike,
functioned as bodyguard in both the protective
and custodial sense. In the airport I wandered off
to look at duty-free cameras and received a scold-
ing.

The Beirut trip was a dangerous prank. I was
making a highly publicized trip through five coun-
tries carrying a fake American passport. The Com-
mander and I studied the geographical chessboard
with care. Each country would be designated as
red-safe or black-risky. We were secure in coun-
tries which received their guns from Russia:
Libya, Egypt, Syria. We were exposed in those
countries armed by America: Tunisia, Lebanon,
Jordan.

The first stop was Tunis. There was a nearby
American air force base. The walls of the men's
room were covered with scurrilous graffiti de-
nouncing niggers. We huddled together nervously
in the corner of the lounge. The Commander and
I felt very close. He was wanted on murder
charges in the USA. We were happy to take off
for Egypt.

Avoiding the new Cairo Hilton we found our-
selves in a luxurious old hotel, a palace built by
the King to house the Empress Eugenia of France
on the occasion of the opening of the Suez Canal.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 173

For ten dollars we rented the imperial suite. Our
little delegation of American revolutionaries was
escorted down sumptuous carpeted corridors lit
by candles reflecting the gilt, past servants and
harem guards standing stiffly at attention. The
furnishings in the rooms were museum pieces.

The Commander, sprawled on silk sheets hav-
ing breakfast in the Imperial bed, Hstened to my
proposal. Our plane was due to land in Cairo late
the next afternoon so I pushed a plan to visit the
pyramids in the morning. He had a fear of expos-
ing us in Cairo, asserting that the city was full of
Zionist agents, Interpol pigs, and CIA informers.

He gave me a lecture for unauthorized conver-
sations with cab drivers. I kept saying, - Right
on Brother in apology. I suggested that we hire a
Umousine to take us to the airport. The pyramids
happened to be on the way. The Commander
played the part. He listened to my crafty vizier
plan and nodded approval. We were a congenial
combination. He's save every scene with a con-
spiratorial smile. At the Great Time Ship of Che-
ops we were invited by guides to walk through a
passageway into the center of the tomb. The Com-
mander freaked. He felt naked without his gun.
He decided to remain outside on guard while we
moved down the stone labyrinth to the center of
the tomb where Aleister Crowley led his bride. It
is a classic Time Traveler's reincarnation capsule
equipped with every facility, memento, charm,
and convenience to facilitate entrance into the
next time dimension.

We shot the next scene at the Sphinx. As our

174 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

cab drew up at the parking lot we were surrounded
by a three-thousand-year-old tribe of experienced
hustlers. I dug the aesthetics of the trap as it
closed around us. We were each circled by a group
of eight guides, maneuvered by body pressure next
to a camel squatting haughty on the desert sand.
I was told to sit down on the camel and take a
picture. When I failed to obey I was pushed down
on the camel seat, my right leg pulled over the
saddle. With an enormous triple jackknife-back-
forward-back motion the beast rose to its full
height. A lash on the ass and we galloped off into
the desert followed by a band of running guides.
A turban had been shoved on my head. Camel
whip in right hand I careened Peter O'Toole across
the sands. I looked back and watched the white
Black Panther fund raiser from New York gallop-
ing behind me followed by another crew of cheer-
ing guides.

Beyond the first dune out of sight of civiliza-
tion the camels suddenly stopped and the guides
began shouting demands for money. The price
was not exorbitant. I peeled off for Marty and
myself and we continued our dash. Mounting a
sand dune I halted the camel and watched the
Commander staggering across the desert toward
me, black leather gleaming in the sun, followed
by a shouting crowd of fellahin, one of whom was
leading a camel. - Pay these mothers off, he
shouted. It was a line used by Napoleon and prob-
ably by Julius Caesar. The Commander could hold
his own in any such crowd.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 175

Our cover was blown on the plane from Cairo to
Beirut by a young long-haired British photogra-
pher. He promised not to expose us. We had a
friendly chat about mutual friends. He asked if
he would be allowed to continue with us to
Amman or wherever we were going as part of our
party, to take pictures over which we could have
veto control. I reported this to the Commander
who became angry. I told the photographer no
deal. He was amiable enough until the airport bus
when the Commander ordered him away from our
party and threatened to break his camera. I had an
ominous feeling that we were making an enemy.
The plan was to check into a hotel and wait until
morning when the Commander would contact the
local al-Fatah to arrange entry to the Palestinian
camps. We ended up by chance at the St. George
Hotel which, we later learned, was press headquar-
ters for the entire Middle East. Answering an early
morning rap on the door, I gazed into the lens of a
CBS TV camera. The reporter held a microphone
and began firing questions. I slammed the door.
Marty went out to scout. He returned, ashen-
faced, to report that journalists, TV crews, and
photographers were waiting in the hallway, in
the lobby, and across the street where they were
studying our hotel windows with binoculars. We
were trapped by the press. The Commander shoul-
dered his way down the hallway and out into the
streets to locate al-Fatah. Our publicity scene was

176 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

SO hot that the local al-Fatah referred the decision
to Amman. The Commander was alarmed. I was
scared. We were dangerously exposed. An Ameri-
can left-wing journalist came up to confirm our
gloomy expectations. There was little other news
breaking in the Middle East at that moment. Ev-
eryone was waiting for the Syrian cabinet to fall.
The international press, bored with war, was zoom-
ing in on our slapstick feature story. The Ameri-
can embassy was pressing the Lebanese Govern-
ment to arrest me for carrying a false passport.
The Palestinians in Amman were delighted by the
buzz and warmly invited us to come, but the prob-
lem was how to enter Jordan quietly without em-
barrassing the King. After long conferences with
local leftists a plan was formulated. We would call
a press conference for early that evening to be
held in the second floor of the hotel. When the
press was lured away, I would duck down a rear
service elevator, exit the hotel from a side door, be
met by a car, and spirited to a hideaway and post
thence to the Syrian border a short auto trip away.

As I stepped off the service elevator to a down-
stairs side dining room, bright television lamps
switched on and cameras whirled. The journalists
had not been fooled. Followed by reporters and
photographers, I went into the street, straight-
armed a Newsweek bureau chief, jumped in the
pickup car, slammed the door, and took oflf. The
Arab chauffeur careened through Beirut.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 177

We were certain that we had eluded our pursu-
ers. The car drove down a side street to a restau-
rant. I was hustled into a rear dining room. After a
couple of minutes the chauffeur ran into the room
to say that our journaUstic pursuers were entering
the restaurant. The chauffeur led me up a stair-
way, opened a door, and shoved me in. I found
myself in a pleasant bedroom/sitting room. An
elderly Arab lady and a five-year-old boy in a crib
looked at me curiously. She spoke no European. I
was forced to make gestures. She nodded and left
the room. After a few minutes she returned with a
pretty girl who smiled in a friendly way. The old
lady pointed us through to another room and shut
the door. We were now in a bedroom. The girl
crooned an Arab love song. Before I could feel
better, the door banged, knob turned. I shoved my
shoulder against the door while two reporters out-
side the hotel shouted questions, appeals, and
threats. With the arrival of a third journahst the
door began to open. I let go, darted through a door
to the rear to the kitchen, and then to a small bath-
room. The bathroom door had no lock. In seconds
the hunters had pushed in. Standing around an
open floor sewer we confronted each other. The
Newsweek man was cool, - Do you really want to
have your press conference here. Why don't we go
into the next room? I sat down in a chair in the
girFs room. The three reporters squatted on the
floor firing questions. My friends were nowhere to
be seen. Anything I said, however parenthetical,
would be taken as a quote ...

A few minutes later friends came. As I came
downstairs cameras flashed and I waved feebly.

178 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

We returned to the St. George Hotel in chagrin. I
smiled wanly to the newsmen clustered around the
door of the hotel room, told the porter to bring
them drinks from the bar with my best wishes. The
rest of that night was spent collating reports from
informers and formulating plan. The Lebanese
Government, having no desire to get embroiled in
a conflict between LSD, al-Fatah, militant Black
Panthers, Jean Genet, and the American Govern-
ment would not arrest us but wondered if it would
be possible for us to hit the road within forty-eight
hours. We knew that radio messages were careen-
ing back and forth between the American embassy
and Washington. In the underground you keep
moving.

At three o'clock in the morning we packed our
bags, paid the bill, and grabbed the 6:00 a.m.
flight to Cairo. Both the press and the Egyptian
Government had been alerted to our arrival. The
Egyptians were pohte but firm. We had to remain
in the Cairo Airport Hotel. There was no plane
from Cairo to Algiers for two days. With a stroke
of diplomatic briUiance the Commander shouted
to the Egyptian official and to the reporters present
that we wanted the embassies of China, North
Korea, and North Vietnam notified of our desire
for sanctuary. Our presence must have provoked
amused head scratching on the part of our hosts.

The next morning a delegation of officials vis-
ited our hotel rooms. We were told that a govern-
ment limousine would take us to a hotel and that
we were to be given Egyptian freedom until our
plane left the following day.

For three days wire-service dispatches reported

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 179

that we were being ejected from one angry Arab
country to another. In truth the reactions of the
Arab countries we visited were humorous and hos-
pitable. The fate of our commando band had been
discussed at cabinet level in four Middle Eastern
countries and perhaps, just perhaps, we contrib-
uted a few moments of levity to the crisis-plagued
Middle East.

12

Safely back in Algeria we^ continued our easy
routine at the Beach Hotel. We took walks in the
sun along the beach and spent quiet evenings
together.

We were hoping to arrange for Algerian resi-
dence papers and a country house. The pohtical
asylum deal was going through but there was a
housing shortage and the prospects of a seaside
villa became entangled in red tape.

We^were somewhat disappointed in the scope of
the Panther operation. There was no broad front
of exiles working out pohtical strategies. There
was Eldridge and a small group of homesick refu-
gees who hved in mihtary restriction, pacing up
and down in villas, peering out windows waiting
for the Oakland pohce to attack. The undercurrent
was anger and frustration. We were learning to
adjust to the new environment

In asking pohtical asylum from a revolutionary
country, we were crossing The Line, fleeing to the
Reds, dejFectlng to the Arabs. Ht was James Bond

f^netic energy magnet that pulled us to Africa.
Abanaonmg tne society or our white forebears,
casting our lot with Them, the dark slaves, we
became racial renegades, now part of that shadow
crew of genetic traitors who haunt white history

182 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

books, frontier western scouts who join the In-
dians, British officers who learn Arabic, smoke Kif ,
join Holy Wars, Darwinian desperadoes leaping
from the sinking white ship, seed opportunities,
shipwrecked sailors on North Africa's mutant
coast of slaves and slavers.

ffie^bagan to experience Black, think Black,
sense every situation in terms of racial overtones
and undercurrent. Wg^said Right On! frequently
and slapped palms in moments of delight.

AV^^dld have trouble with the motto Shoot to
Kill. We suggested Aim for Life or Shoot to Live.

Eldridge came to visit us at the hotel. He
checked out entrances and exits.

- Seeking escape routes, Eldridge?

- He squinted his eyes and reflected a long time
before answering. It was his oriental habit.

- As a matter of fact, I was checking entry
points.

Eldridge was moody. At times when I came to
the embassy he was rude; other times friendly,
inquiring about our move to the apartment in the
city, asking interested questions about what we
were doing or whom we were seeing. He asked a
lot about acid. He inquired about my financial
transactions. In comradely soHdarity he would
join me in berating lawyers, publishers, and re-
porters. We had a lot in common. It was a new
experience for me to be dependent on a strong
variable, sexually restless, charismatic leader, who
was insanely erratic. I usually played that role
myself.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 183

Eldridge did not hide his disapproval of^our
life-style. Basically he dug it but believed that per-
sonal freedom and hedonic experiments should be
postponed. The free life-style was an instrument in
the evolutionary unfolding. His vocabulary was
political. Ours^ was biological mutation, molting,
metamorphosis.

The younger Panthers seemed to welcome my
visits but, in general, cheerfulness was revision-
ism. - Goddamnit, what are you always smiling
about? You think you are free?

Sometimes we would talk intimately about our
mutual prison contacts. Usually Eldridge treated
us with arrogant superiority He gave me the col-
lected works of Kim II Sung. He suggested that we
have our mail sent to the Panther post-office box
in the Grande Poste. A Panther drove down every
morning to pick up the incoming letters and pack-
ages. It was a communal gesture, having our
address in care of the Black Panthers.

After a while She refused to come in the em-
bassy and would wait outside in the car. Shp
longed for contact with Kathleen and the o3ier
Panther women. Love gets so twisted.

Twice a week I would drive to the Panther em-
bassy in El Biar to pick up the mail, which was
often battered and torn.

The attitude of the Panthers changed after the
Beirut debacle. I was no longer Tim. They called
me Leary. The Panther scene seemed low on en-
thusiasm. An uneasy distance developed. I offered
my energies to the cause but there JJidn't seem to
be much for anyone to do. It was a media trip.
They had rooms filled with magazines and daily

184 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

copies of the Paris Herald Tribune and the New
York Times. Agents from all over the world sent
clippings and newspapers. Husky warriors were
kept busy filing paper. It was politically and emo-
tionally frustrating.

The sexual vibrations of the country were
gloomy as well. The Algerian men proved during
the revolution that they were the toughest fighters
in the Arab world. With victory and independence,
an orgiastic feeling of free energy swept the coun-
try. The lid was blown. Veils were off the women.
Bearded, long-haired warriors walked the streets.
Then, as after all revolutions, the new socialist
rulers closed it down. Pohtical revolutions inevita-
bly lead to restrictions of sexual freedom. The
Hvely variety of the fading empire is replaced by
puritan virtue.

Algiers was again a sad, bored, uptight town.
The women were back in veils. They moved in
gray robes timidly flashing disappointed eyes
and ankles. After sunset there were only men in
the streets. The young, handsome dudes, shaved,
moustached and dressed to flutter collected in
nervous crowds along the sidewalk cafes to drink
and argue. There was no action. Sexual frenzy but
no girls. The Revolution wasn't freeing what every-
one longed to have. The male grapevine knew ex-
actly how many unveiled women were in the city.
Three Swedish Ballet dancers at the AUetti Hotel.
Two secretaries for American oil companies at the
St. George. Four girl tourists arrived on the five
thirty Air France from Paris. Whispers among the
roosters. The kids at the university were seething
but no outlet. Fun was forbidden. Rock and roll.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 185

Miniskirts, long hair. Dope. Free speech. All
banned by the government. The university ran on
the' old French professorial autocratic system. The
hope there, as everywhere, is with the women.
College women refused to wear veils and that took
courage. High government ministers had women
in government-owned beach houses. There was a
small call-girl setup around the two big hotels for
visiting oilmen. The kids listened to French rock
stations and dreamed of getting out of the country.
Ambitious young men wdth moustaches stuck in
sociaHst offices behind typewriters, saved money
for two summer weeks in Majorca to stock up on
Swedish girl memories to lie. about during the long
gray winter in the girlless cafes.

And the Panthers roared along the main street
in their cars and strutted up the broad steps of the
Grande Poste in black leather. Their noble confi-
dence provoked ennui.

S^stayed in our hotel suite on the beach.^he is
an interior decorator by nature and wove soft rugs
and flying carpets of bliss.

Eldridge was often after me about money. His
budget was high. I pledged half the profits from
writing this book. That was many versions ago. He
pressed for specific figures. I said that ten thou-
sand dollars would be reasonable. In America over
90 percent of our income went to the government
or to lav^ers. The ten thousand was a tax. It's an
old biological custom: symbiosis. The oldest po-
litical game. The Panthers virtuously demanded
everything they could get from American visitors.
Wg were deprived exiles. Algerian shops were ex-
pensive and empty of American goods. It seemed

186 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

reasonable that visitors who breezed in with valid
American passports should leave their excess cap-
italist luxuries.

Once, a white visitor staying at the embassy
handed me a book he had bought. A Panther
grabbed it and said, - You been here three days
and didn't tell us you had that book. What else you
got in you bag we haven't seen.

We were kept isolated. We'd hear about reporters
in town looking for us, or friends who couldn't get
through the Panther cordon. We were kept silent
and immobilized.

E.G. often complained about the political capital
he had invested in us and the problem that long-
haired hippies and dopers caused him. I said that
if our presence in Algeria created problems for the
government or for the Panthers jv£d be glad to
move on. E.G. said that there was no country in
the world that would harbor us. Gapitalist countries
work with Interpol. No socialist country is going to
protect a drug advocate. Eldridge made it clear that
only his influence with the Algerian Government
was keeping us out of prison.

Many of these undercurrent dissatisfactions
emerged when the Panthers ousted our friend
Rdndy, a twenty-four-year-old handsome spiritual
presence. He moved with the grace of a Tai Ghi
adept. He came to Algeria from the Middle East.
He had been busted by Pakistani police. That cost
him two thousand in bribes. And again by the
Lebanese customs. He was hoping to relax with us
in the freedom of Algerian sunshine.

When he walked into the Panther office, happy
to be with outlaw brothers, and asked for our ad-

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 187

dress, his luggage was searched. He was frisked.
Mug shots made. He was cross-examined. When
asked about dope he cheerfully produced a large
slab of hashish which he had artfully smuggled.
The dope was confiscated, his bags removed, and
Randy was instructed to wait in a side room.

Notified hours later of his arrival, I drove hap-
pily to pick him up. Where are your bags. He
motioned to the office. I grabbed them and we
drove off. In the car Randy told me of his recep-
tion. He was angry.

The next time I visited the embassy I raised the
issue with the Commander. He was indignant that
my friend had complained. He defended the se-
curity measures. Algiers was swarming with CIA
agents disguised as hippies sent to assassinate
Panthers. Everyone was suspect. There's no third
way. You are either part of the solution or you are
part of the problem. That was the sacred slogan.

I argued for a broad political coalition. The
Panthers wanted a small hard-core military band.
It's the old refrain. Open it up. Close it down.

- We are setting up a revolutionary police force
here. We have to be tougher than the imperiahsts.
When we come to power, we're not going to let
people take any drugs they want. You know we're
no prudes. That hash sure is good. Too bad you
haven't gotten to try it yet. Don't forget we have
total control over Americans who come to Algeria.
We're the official embassy. The Algerian Govern-
ment doesn't even recognize Nixon's Government.
This is liberated revolutionary turf. We can search.
We can seize. We can arrest. We can confine
people as long as we want. We can do worse than

188 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

prison. And we have. We cannot tarry with talk
about civil rights.

- Did you say civil right3, I asked.

- Don't mention civil rights to Eldridge or you'll
never get your hash back.

The Commander smiled. I'll vote for him for
Sheriff anytime.

Eldridge phoned and said he'd be out to the
hotel. It was a curious visit. Eldridge and Kathleen
arrived elegant and haughty. They were social su-
periors coming down from the fashionable embassy
hills to visit the disarray of our hotel room.

- What's that horrible smell, said Kathleen. I
hate incense.

She is a beautiful, intense, strong woman not
totally comfortable playing executive wife. She
spoke in moraUstic certainties. Eldridge and I went
next door to discuss business. Eldridge asked me
about money. Then he produced the hashish with
a smile.

- Good shit, man.

Only a third of the original slab was there.

- Are you going to give us half?

I broke the fragment and gave him the fifth
sixth.

- When you move to that apartment in the city
we'll spend more time together.

The next visit to the embassy, E.G. spoke with
some enthusiasm about a new plan. He would
interview me with a tape recorder. Eldridge too
had been the subject of a Playboy interview. The
editors asked me to write a letter to the editor about
the interview. It was the only letter printed which

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 189

honored Eldridge. Eldridge said that such an inter-
view would enable us to discuss the various per-
spectives which we shared or did not share and
allow me to be presented to the world as a poHtical
figure.

Eldridge believed that we had performed service
to the Revolution by encouraging dropout. But now
that destructive phase was over. It was time to tell
the kids to drop back in, turn off, cut their hair, and
work dihgently for the new Maoist order. - I'm a
journalist basically, he said.

The interview never took place. Instead came
Bella to our hotel accompanied by an Algerian
friend named Ahmed. He was an official in a gov-
ernment industry, intelligent, intense, sincere. He
wore short hair, white shirts, dark business suits,
and talked passionately about armed struggle and
violent revolution. Bella was a New Yorker who
had worked for the Algerian Revolution during the
war. She was protected by top ministers with
whom she had lived and worked in the exciting
days of armed struggle. She worked for a govern-
ment publication but her central role was as a
sponsor and adviser to Eldridge and the Panthers.

She was a great woman who lived richly. She
was wired to violent dangerous revolutionists, gam-
bhng for and using power. She knew a lot, felt
deeply, and was always ready for action. Boom,
boom, she could tell one of the great woman stories
of our time. But the Revolution had disappointed
her. Her love was expressed in true believing. Her
favorite word was "political."

She came (sent by Eldridge) with the proposal
that Ahmed would interview me in French. She

190 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

would translate and we would publish a book in
English and French which would explain the
cultural revolution and our conversion to Maoism
so that the European left would understand what
Eldridge was doing with us in Algiers. We would
make money too. She had talked to Eldridge about
setting up a publishing company.

It was agreed that I would come to Bella's apart-
ment in Algiers two nights a week.

My loyal companion came with me to the first
meetings and contributed a poignant version of
our first meeting and our life together. Then she ^
got bored and stayed home.

The interviews were complex. Ahmed would ask
questions in French. I would answer in English.
It was all taped. Bella would translate. We would
drink strong Algerian wine. Bella would gracefuly
excuse herself and miraculously produce a gourmet
dinner. She was an international wonder.

Ahmed was opinionated. When my answers fit
the current Maoist line he would clap my shoulder
and beam. He liked my critical analysis of the rise
of American imperiahsm during World War II and
the decline and fall during the roaring sixties. He
held four cards which he continually produced to
trump my logic : Hiroshima, Armed Struggle, Viet-
nam, and Racism. If I failed to include any of
these topics, he would challenge the omission. I
would drink wine and produce bawdy Lenny Bruce
vignettes of American life. Ken Kesey, Allen Gins-
berg, Gary Snyder hedonic-guerrilla tactics turning
on the country, corrupting youth, kicking out the
jams, blowing minds, encouraging the process of
cutting loose, dropping out, living free. Ahmed

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 191

would frown and mutter in French unless I closed
each rap with the phrase "in order to end the war
in Vietnam, crush racism, and destroy the white
bourgeois mentality." I used to kid him about loos-
ening his white collar and after a while he started
wearing sport shirts.

I was talking too much, getting too far out. It's
a lucky thing there was no cocaine around. Bella
encouraged me with her pleasure and assurance
that when the tapes were typed up we could edit
out anything that was indiscreet. Bella agreed with
the Reichian theories of the sexual basis for politi-
cal postures and the importance of adolescent
erotic imprints on subsequent political feelings but
she felt that it was too personal to be accepted by
the serious European left opinion that was to be
the eventual judge of our political rehabilitation in
the sociahst world.

Bella interpreted every event as supporting The
Revolution or helping American imperialism. She
spoke of Eldridge as the most brilliant political
mind she had ever known. She said that Ahmed
was the second-best political mind. It was interest-
ing to discuss politics with professional revolu-
tionaries. The universe in all its wonders was
reduced to the simple duaUsm : Is this useful for us
or useful to them.

I realized that Eldridge would be listening to the
megalomaniac tapes so on them and during our
occasional meetings, I encouraged him to act with
bold confidence. He was closing off into a suspi-
cious, angry doctrinaire place, denouncing the Al-
gerian Government, the Russian * Government,
racists everywhere, Arab and European. He was in-

192 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

creasingly bitter about political developments in
America. He attacked Angela Davis for being a
Russian agent, for stealing headlines from the
Panthers. "The sweet case of Angela Davis," he
would mutter. He heaped ridicule on the Yippies,
Abbie Hoffman, Jerry Rubin, Leroi Jones, Stokely
Carmichael, Martin Luther King, James Baldwin,
white protesters, the Berrigans. He did not hke
George Jackson's writings. He saw revisionist ten-
dencies everywhere. He refrained from criticizing
Huey Newton, whose picture hung in the waiting
room. He hked the Weathermen, particularly
Bernadine Dohrn whom he called the witch. Ac-
cording to his version, the Weathermen were angry
Red Guard heroes intent on violence. He didn't re-
spond when I told him that the Weathermen were
nonviolent people open to new models for the world
to come and that they were not about to parrot
Maoism. But as another disappointed visionary, I
knew how he felt.

13

One of the young Panthers requested that I
supply him with a certain kind of peppermint
candy sold at the beach. Next time I arrived at the
embassy he assumed an extortion stance while I
pulled out confections from my briefcase like a
rich Jewish boy at P.S. 76.

- You sure you got no more, he demanded
suspiciously.

I pretended to search, looked in his surprised
eyes, suddenly slapped his open left palm in the
Panther intimate brother ritual and laughed. They
really couldn't deal with freaks.

- Now where is my mail, I said.

He handed me a large, torn-open manila en-
velope which contained a bulky manuscript. He
said some hippie had come looking for us and left
a copy of a book he had written. Sitting in the car
I examined the manuscript, Whisper by Brian
Barritt. The writing was the f amiUar script from
San Luis, molecular strings of precise poetic
chemistry. I felt that old feeling of mystery, para-
dox, and magic, good magic to liberate. The
message and the style was what my nervous sys-
tem wanted to transmit. I drove home quickly
wondering what it could mean — ^wondering why
the Englishman, namesake of my prison electri-

194 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

cian, unknown author of a genius work, was now
in Algeria looking for us.

When I handed the manuscript to Her, she said,
- Here we go again; he is a great writer. Can he
write some script to get us out of this prison?

The next morning the desk clerk phoned. A
Monsieur Bahreet was inquiring. A moment later
brought a knock on the door. I turned the knob
and autopilot jettisoned a time-pimp onto our
screen. There stood the genuine Brian Barritt,
Bonne Chance, the slim-hipped gambler with a girl
he called liz the Cosmic Hoar. Little David, four
years new, was with them.

- The Pimp, the Parson, and the Pusher await
your desire, he said. Looking for something? Like
a woman, a God, a fix?

- We are looking for a space to drop some time
in, I replied.

- I hear you got voodoo troubles. Papa Doc juju
baby beating drums at El Biar? You are better off
with the brown chicks in the Casbah than them
phosphorescent green Panthers walled in that
Uquid pink embassy. He handed me a sheet of
grimy paper. Here's a nice space. Used to be used
as an army stash during the revolution. As the war
raged through the Casbah a pocket of guerrillas
were trapped inside so it became a shrine and now
the Shira smokers got it back again. It's dug in the
side of the mountain by twelfth-century Turkish
gnomes right under the rue Diable, a nice hovel to
spend a bit of time.

- Where? I asked.

- Where else? In the Casbah, he said.

Brian is an English Untouchable. His shadow

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 195

falling across the path of middle class is enough to
contaminate twenty lives. He is highly toxic. He
wasn't sent to Coventry, he was bom there.

Brian was bom a dropout. Every month during
his childhood his father made a journey to London
and returned with four immense bottles of dark
brown laudanum, then sat in his wooden chair,
spat into the fire, and spent the evening sipping
Opium from a silver spoon. At the age of ten, as
World War II raged in the shell-shocked sky,
Coventry urchins played among the ruins of the
city and unearthed unbelievable riches from the
bombed-out homes. They squatted under floor
boards of mutilated tenements, sucking hollowed
elderberry stems, and they inhaled fumes from the
sap of scarlet poppies sprinkling bomb craters.

Brian is ancient but not old, for old is a person
who expects to die of decay. Young is a person
who admits the possibility of dying by other means.
He has put as many drugs as possible into his body
for thirty-six years and is obscenely healthy, dia-
bohcally wealthy, and looks about twenty. He
intends to maintain this state for an indefinite
period. He is not going to die; they will have to
kill him.

We sat on cushions in our hotel room reviewing
threads which had led us all to North Africa. Brian
was especially dehghted by our story of the prison
electrician dope dealer who had somehow found
a copy of his Whisper and also taken his name.
We were entranced by all of his tales.

At sixteen, he took one look at the grease and
beer stupor of Coventry auto assembly hnes, and
shipped out to see. His first ship, the Sugar Pro-

196 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

ducer, was a rusty tub of barnacled depreciation
so unseaworthy that only alcoholic scum would
keep it afloat. There was a free rum ration. The
entire crew had a grog habit. A Maltese fireman
turned him onto grass smoked solely for intoxica-
tion. Dig this innocent seventeen-year-old, small,
wiry, with fresh blue eyes walking through the
wicked streets of Kingston town breathing fumes
of liquor and perfume of whore. Whenever he'd
enter a brothel wide-eyed sailors smiled and the
whores clustered around. He quickly learned to use
his youth and small stature. (The best comedians
and lovers are usually of small stature. ) He always
told the whores he was a virgin and was conse-
quently engulfed by erotic solicitude — sucked and
fucked without having to pay.

His postgraduate training came in the army;
three years of AWOL, stockades, marriage, drugs,
and mysticism. The British troops in Cyprus were
stationed in the post office overlooking Ataturk
Square where, as bombs exploded, lascivious girls
climbed rope ladders hung down by lustful Tom-
mies. The army mission was to search for arms —
an excellent excuse to wander through the back
alleys and corridors of leisure. Just about one mid-
night he got busted for sleeping on guard duty.

It became a sort of yoga pilgrimage for Barritt
to spend some time in each British military prison
including the grim Colchester.

After discharge, he dropped down into the Lon-
don underground and lived with various women,
painting and pushing grass. He used art as a
method of flipping into trance states, hands whirl-

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 197

ing, brush flashing color on cloth. It was all magic
by this time.

The books on magic, especially those by Aleister
Crowley, and his own opium experiences, prepared
Brian for the acid which hit London in 1965. It was
a classic lysergic education. He had never heard
of a bad trip nor dreamed of such ecstasy. He
and his wife then headed for India to pass through
the conventional stages of the alchemical appren-
ticeship, Kahlighat Calcutta to touch base with
Ramakrishna, elementary chillum smoking in
Benares, following the occult trail of Burton,
Crowley, Gurdjieff, and Sir John Woodruff to the
secret tantric shrine north a bit from Delhi where
temple prostitutes v^th painted eyes and golden
bracelets still sit for hours on your cock murmuring
nonstop ommmmmm. Then they took the second-
class bus from Khategodam which winds up spiral
roads through the foothills of the Himalaya to
Almora to study with Lama Anagorika Govinda,
whose Foundations of Tibetian Mysticism was the
hot book of the season. They arrived in Almora a
few weeks after we left.

Near Quetta Pakistan, Brian went on a two-
day camel journey into the desert to attend a re-
ligious hashish smoking ritual.

- So that put me well in with that particular
smoking family which was composed of fakirs
and wandering holy men. Abi BuUa who ran the
hash shop invited us to Menika, a valley snowed
in most of the year where the tribal hash was
grown, so I could see the whole process and stay
in the valley the whole year becaus.e there was no

198 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

way out for eight months when snow blocked the
passes.

It was necessary to buy a couple of donkeys to
make the trip so it was decided that Brian and his
wife would fly back to London with seven and a
quarter pounds sewn into thin waistcoats with
lots of pockets and worn underneath their shirts.

Uxbridge, England Magistrate's Court: seven
and a quarter pounds of hash on the table smell-
ing of intrigue and Assassins and a pair of glitter-
ing brass scales held in the policemen's hand.

- You will go to prison for four years.

He went to prison to get away from chicks like
a monastery man. He spent the time in solitary
meditation, a spiritual trip, avoiding prison com-
panionship and absorbing Tarot, Cabala, and sen-
sational press articles about the psychedelic
revolution. He wrote as a method of getting high.

The scripts were written in minute style on
small pieces of paper, rolled and scotch-taped
under his penis to escape detection during the pat-
down inspection.

Two-thirds of the scripts were never recovered
from the recipient friends. The remainder were
assembled, typed on small sheets of paper and
shuffled into various card combinations. Twenty
copies of the first mimeographed soft-cover edi-
tion had been sent to a headshop bookstore in
Los Angeles which seemed to account for the elec-
trician, whose literary taste could not be disputed.

While Brian talked, Little David Lark drew
mandalas with colored crayons, ate apples, and
made enigmatic Zen master comments. And Liz,
soft and round as Eden fruit with hennaed hair

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 199

and pink moist lips, smiled with wise eyes. They
floated like Time Travelers do through space,
making the planet Earth their private garden of
incredible goodies freely offered to the happily
unattached.

- I visited the Panther embassy and was
amazed. There's no white guilt down in the Porto-
bello ghetto of dropouts, junkies, and husttos.
Just drop out of the white middle class and deal
with each person as an individual hustUng plea-
sure like yourself.

Brian pulled another grimy paper from his
pocket.

- The eternal racial seed conflict always enor-
mous in scope over time has now been reduced by
radio and TV to one big black-white world heavy-
weight match obliterating the sensual texture of
the variegated color boards of lovely local racisms.
Mother Earth is a racist. Rainbow colors turn her
on.

- What else is new in the casbah. She said.

- Oh, the casbah cafes seethe with Muhammad
Ah. He's the worldwide television symbol unifying
the self-image of three-quarters of the human race
who know they had the world championship stolen
from them by some white cat behind a desk up
north.

Brian squatted Japanese style in our room and
i;Mbbed his hands lovingly along his legs as opium
smokers do, his blue eyes laughing. He looks hke
the Fool in the Marseille Tarot deck.

He told us about an Algerian town named Bou
Saada which his Casbah friends recommended for
magic. After Brian and Liz and Davie left, we

200 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

looked it up in the guide book: City of Happiness,
it was called— the Gateway to the Sahara. We de-
cided to spUt the next day.

^S^ packed the car and drove by the embassy.
She waited in the car while I went in to get the
mail. As usual the large envelopes were ripped
open. The Commander grinned cheerfully.

We headed down the bay freeway. It was slow-
going five o'clock traffic through industrial slums
past the river stinking of pollution. Out beyond
El Harach, farmland and tall trees lined the road.
At dark we gassed up at El Arba. The attendant
warned about the curves on the mountains. It
was dark and raining when the climb started. A
hard drive. Corkscrew turns, no road signs or
reflectors, and a half-mile drop. Relief when we
hit the summit. Europe and all that was behind.
We were rolling down to the Sahara. The descent
was easier. The road leveled out to a string. ^She
flipped on the tape machine. Orion was visible,
the first pure radiation in weeks. You could smell
the desert in the dry fresh air. We were feeling
better and better.

Just at eight o'clock we sailed over a fittle hill
and saw the Ughts of Bou Saada nestled in the
valley. On the outskirts a sign pointed left to a
big red neon light. Hotel Caid. It was brand-new,
marble, a desert fortress, the lobby arched and
domed. A big bustle of porters and clerks, yv^
were the only guests. While unpacking, the desk
phoned. The Chef wanted to know if we were
dining.

The waiters were kids just graduated from the
hotel academy and they made it a flirtatious

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 201

comedy scene. They winked at Her and put flowers
by her plate. God bless the young, She said. After
dinner we walked up to the roof terrace and looked
down on the classic picture postcard desert town,
donkey cries, muezzin call. The clearest star-fiUed
sky of all.

After breakfast the next morning, we were
told that our guide awaited us. They pointed to the
doorman, who made a hand sign. He spoke En-
glish. Robed and turbaned. Wise old face.

- Good evening. I am Boubekadir. It's a fine
tomorrow, I speak a few good English, he said.

The town was a jewel. We had pushed the
time-trip button. Except for a few cars it was a
thousand-year landing strip. Turbaned dignity.
Slow easy village rhythm. No one hurrying. Every-
one seemed to be high, digging everything, blue
morning, tattooed desert crones, shoemakers and
leather workers on the sidewalk.

Monsieur Boubekadir guided us to a hill above
town to a simple strong domed tomb. He told the
legend. A French painter and his wife came to
spend the weekend in the City of Happiness. They
stayed forty years. Everyone loved them. He
looked at us. We looked at each other. Well why
not? It's the best offer we've had this season. The
guide started some diagnostic questions. What
did we want to see?

- Is there a place near here, an oasis perhaps,
a place of peace and beauty? A spot where people
rest and think? He nodded.

We drove through town, down the highway,
and cut off on a side road, along beat-up cement
sifted over with sand. After a while the road

202 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

turned left and ran along a wide flood-river bank
now dry. The road was washed out. A row of rocks
warning to turn off and climb down and up a
gully. Monsieur B. pointed to some striped tents,
dogs barking, kids playing, smoke rising.

- Nomads.

The sun was half-high and hot. We shared
crackers and bottled water with the guide. Still
following the dry river valley we reached rugged
country. High bluffs and sand. Just before a knoll.
Monsieur B. said to gear down to first and prepare
to hit it. The car climbed into sand, the gunning
motor just pulled us through.

- Voild, He pointed.

Below was an oasis. The stream was blue
sparkling.

- They made the movie Samson and Delilah
there.

Parked under a palm tree, Monsieur B. trotted
to a sky-high dune of soft sand, ran twenty feet
up, sat down, took off his shoes, and motioned us
to follow. We lay there for half hour no one saying
a word, just absorbing the message. Monsieur B.
sat up. He was pleased.

- Not bad, eh?

I scrambled barefoot to the top and found
just what we were looking for. A little cup shaded
and protected by some bushes. You couldn't be
seen from below. A perfect place.

- Come up. I've found the spot.

- Ill take your word for it. Tomorrow.
There was a nice feeling in the car driving back.

We had drawn close together on the sand dune.

- You have found the spot, he said. The sheer

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 203

act of sitting on a favorable spot creates superior
strength. He explained that we had replenished
our energy.

I asked him if there were other such spots
around there. There were many in that area, the
shepherds and nomads knew them. I asked if they
would mind if we came back. Not if you come for
a serious purpose to be quiet and absorb the
goodness [honte]. But those who come noisily to
drink wine and be foolish would not be welcome
and bad things might even happen.

After lunch Monsieur B. was waiting. We
wanted to buy a rug and two Arab robes. First
the market square. Under arcades men squatted
deftly sewing. Smooth manual mantras hour after
hour watching, listening, gossiping, weaving fab-
ric of village life. Sewn into the garment of tribal
time. For a thousand years they had seen it come
and go before their eyes skillfully performing same
rituals, holding it together. Men came running
with burnooses. A creamy elegance and a soft
blue for Her? There was some mild question about
price and Monsieur B. motioned us around corner
down back alleys to a wooden door.

- Cheaper price here.

The burnooses were not as elegant and one
was spotted. We made a second-class bargain.
Walking back "across the square he said to keep
them hidden from the weavers under the arcades.

A friend opened his Httle rug stall by lantern
light. Algerian rugs are stern, spartan, rustic
warrior. None of your soft Persian luxury. We got
a two-seater that seemed sturdy enough to take the
buffeting of outer space.

204 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

Drinking mint tea at a sidewalk cafe we asked
Monsieur B. about the desert.

- That's a broad question, he joked.

- People have said that one finds magic in the
desert. Is that true Monsieur Boubekadir?

He smiled.

- People say many things about the Sahara.
It is hard to talk about [discuter]. Each one finds
something different there. Men in the oasis have
spent lifetimes talking about the desert. Some
say that you go to the desert as you go to God.
In the Sahara you have only what you have
brought and you bring back what you are ready
to find. Certain things are obvious. You will not
find man-made things. What will you find? Si-
lence? Lonely space. Infinity. Eternity. A knowl-
edge that comes from emptiness and purity
[purete]. Some say the desert teaches a man
what he needs and what is nonessential. There
are two mistakes about the desert. The Sahara
is not hot. Most of the time it is cold. And the
desert is not dry. It is liquid in slow motion. I
go to the dune as one goes to the sea. To he on my
back and float.

The muezzin's call at dawn woke us the follow-
ing day. I put the rug and burnooses in the car.
She put the pipe^ a silken veil, the ritual tools in
one of two coarse, red camel-wool pillowcases that
ripped in the middle. We bought a bottle of water,
four oranges, and put them in the other pillow-
case.

We^ drove back out to the side road and waved
to the nomads. The sun was hot. Gunned the motor

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 205

up the sandy hill. Looked down with anticipation
to the oasis and the dune. But it was now covered
with sheep. A shepherd lay on the dune near
where we had been yesterday. A blow of disap-
pointment.

I parked under a palm tree and went over
to talk. The shepherd's face was wrinkled and
friendly. He spoke a Uttle French. We discussed
the drought, the beauty of the oasis. The shepherds
were driving their flocks to town for slaughter
because of drought. I explained that we were seek-
ing a place in the desert where we could spend the
day quietly. To be still [silencieux]. The shepherd
seemed pleased by this and pointed across the
riverbed to a valley.

- Go with God, he said.

A dune blocked the road so we drove into the
riverbed following tire tracks for a mile and
pulled over to the side. I took the rug and one
bumoose over my shoulder and one pillow around
my neck. Shg took one burnoose and the other
pillowcase. We locked the car and crossed the river
where it ran ten feet wide over gravel and hiked
up into the valley. It was very hot. A strange
heaviness made the going hard. I kept throwing
down the rug and sitting on it waiting f or_ Her.
\ye yere badly out of mountain shape. Her face
was red and a bit cross. ^

- Far out how I'm always following you through
deserts.

Up the valley we ran into sand. It was difficult
walking.

- I don't think I can go much farther. She

206 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

said. And we'll have to find shade. I pointed half-
way up the slope to a cup protected by a few
scrawny bushes. The only vegetation in sight.

- Can you make it up to there?

- rU try. There seemed to be some force pushing
us back. Making us depressed and irritable. The
trick is to find a launching site where no one can
see the Time Ship leave. But such places, free
from planetary vibrations, are hard to reach.

I stumbled up to the cup. It was ideal. A sweet
resting place in the shade. I threw down the rug.
She pointed and screamed.

- Snake.

A large viper was coiled under the bush. It
was his site. Naturally every shady spot was
claimed. Our eyes met. Shall we go back? All the
signs seem wrong. I looked up the valley of sand.

- There seems to be another little shade place
ahead. On that mound.

- With another little inhabitant?

We trudged on, aware of tracks, like footprints
in the snow. There are no secrets in the desert.

- No humans have been here for weeks.

We could see little animal tracks, mice and
insect trails and the curving path of snake.

Approaching the mound I studied the sand
carefully. I threw the rug and examined around
the bushes. She started arranging things. I walked
out the enSy^track about fifteen feet and then
started an electron orbit around the mound. Look-
ing for tracks and leaving human signs. Dragging
my feet I made two orbits so that no creature
could enter without knowing we were there. Send-
ing friendly creature messages.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 207

After the customary preparations we plunged
outward cutting a pathway of law through the
tumbling chaos of interplanetary time. We were
dropping dropping through layers of pluriverses
in a barely controlled escape curve. Soon we must
give the order to slow down and halt on one level.
We had no idea which one to choose. In the vast
multiverse we're all merely scattered seeds —
seeds that must survive many elements if we are
to grow. In four-dimension space it appeared as
solid. From time one could see universes separated
from one another by layers. The universes re-
mained unknown to one another, unrealizing they
were each part of a composite structure of fan-
tastic complexity. We decided that the next uni-
verse irrespective of what it was, should be the
one to enter. Our brains were computing madly the
data pouring in. First reports indicated that this
new galaxy was scarcely different from our own.
We weren't surprised. Each layer of the multiverse
differs only sHghtly from the next.

It was a planet of purity. The earth was pure
gold, sky pure blue. And that was all. We had
found the intersection of form and substance.
Coming in from time so rapidly required a certain
effort in order to center attention on only one
plane. As soon as we relaxed we felt the absolute
pleasure of dwelling on all planes simultaneously.
We existed in a place where the air was jeweled
and faceted, ghstening and alive with myriad
colors, flashing, scintillating, and beautiful.

She appeared in Her divine radiance, manifest-
ing*"S5t^eral images simultaneously containing a
different combination of colors. It was as if She

208 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

looked out through a series of tinted, opaque masks
covering^ Her body and interweaving on either side.
The image that I took to be the original lay
slightly to one side of the multiple image and in
better focus than the rest. She smiled.
■- Have we become one entity?

— No. It is simply that existing on the multl-
. versal level, in Time, we are capable of linking

neurologies to form a powerful single unit.

On an ocean of sand. Where does it come from?
Sand creates itself. Each grain a uniform cutting —
crystal blown against cliffs, wearing down moun-
tains, chiseling away promontories of individu-
ality hurled by the waves against the coast.

Sand is an addictive substance. Grab handfuls
and drip paint wdth it. Bas-relief. Build castles,
forts, an empire. It's a truth drug. Time's simple
message. Draw diagrams. Formulas. Write the
one great simple truth. In sand. Love letters in
the sand.

I placed my hand on it. Sahara sable is finer
than sea sand. Fingers sifted into the warmth. It
became firmer harder, moister, cold. We swelter
in desert sun while inches below there is a wet
cold world.

— It's all desert. She laughed.

Suddenly He came. El Arabi. God of the desert.
His message registered in the mind as sound but
the ears claimed to have heard nothing. Several
thousand years of memory tape. Thirst. Heat.
Oasis. Possession. Treachery. Suspicion. Hospi-
tality. Skin hunger for soft oils and perfumes. Ear
thirst for sound of splashing liquid. Wktching
the stars. Fierce struggle to survive. Harsh. Loy-

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 209

alty. Treachery. Blood on the sand. Sperm on the
sand. Sandstorm.

We could look through sand and see valley of
vegetation now covered up by the relentless en-
gulfing grasp of sand. Sand is cancer eating up
earth. Mountains of sand crushing down on life.
Pressure creating oil.

Sand is essence of mineral.

Oil is essence of life.

Sand is the worst enemy of machine. Oil lubri-
cates. The contest of mineral and biological.

- Which side do you root for?

Sh£ laughed. We drank a mouthful of water
from the flask and knew what that meant.

I walked out into the desert and felt lonely
beyond human contact. I looked back to proton
center. She was sitting on the mound of Venus.
I leaped back up sculptured footprints. We lit a
smoke. She inhaled deeply and held smoke letting
eyes and cheeks bulge comic.

The wind blew against our backs softly. We
could feel it. Then hear it. Then see it ripphng
the sand. The sun was setting and from down
below we heard the cry of shepherd calling flocks
down from the mountain. We packed the pillow-
cases and folded the rug. Walking down we under-
stood about the veil.

After breakfast we drove to the marketplace.
There were some loose ends to be woven. The
tailors brought out the stately cream and the soft
blue. We were ready for them now.

Checking out, we said "soon" to Monsieur Bou-
bekadir. He had many plans for us. *

210 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

The highway through the desert. Chipped a
bit of sunshine. Floating the highway.

At a crossroads we passed two hekneted motor-
cycle cops. They waved.

Later in the rear-view mirrow we saw them
coming hunched over in ominous pursuit. We
opened windows to air out the car. Normal alert
procedures. They roared by.

Then later they loomed up ahead, bikes parked,
flagging us down. Second-stage alert. Stalled car.
Two men in robes talking Arab. The cop asked
if we'd take them to the nearest town for some
oil.

- Oil? I happen to have some with me.

The cop helped me jimmy open the trunk and
I produced a can. The robed driver offered to pay.

- No, friend. It is a gift.

- We're so lucky, She said. We keep getting
second chances.

The road became a time tunnel. We left the
desert, camels, donkeys, women at 900 a.d. and
started climbing into valley farmland 1910 a.d.
Then the road became a twisting two-lane strip
which shifted with each land contour, the sensual
kinesthetic motoring of 1935 a.d.

The car slowed down to pick its way through
village crowds hke a well-trained pony. Sun Ra
tapes rolhng as we came through farmland 1950
A.D. to the industrial slums of rusty, grimy 1970.

The staif at the hotel were happy to see us. The
manager called me aside.

- You had one phone call. They wanted to know
where you were. I told them I didn't know.

After carrying bags to the room I came down-

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 211

Stairs and phoned the embassy prepared to flood
the wire with enthusiasm.

- We got so much to tell you Eldridge. You and
Kathleen gotta come to the desert with us. His
voice came back so cold.

- We gotta lot to tell you. You left town with-
out permission. This is a disciplinary matter for
the Commander. He'll be in touch with you.

The next visit to the embassy the Commander
was laughing and jolly as he inquired about our
trip. His arm around my shoulder we walked to
the wall map and I showed him exactly where we
experienced the desert. I babbled about broadening
our perspectives and getting to know Africa and
so on. liie Commander kept saying - Gee whiz,
and - Far out and - Right on. When I finished he
shifted into the tough cop gear, accusing us of
leaving without authority. I was ready, zip-zap,
and pointed out that Bella not only suggested the
trip, but told us where to stay and that I knew
that he knew that I knew that they knew at all
times where we were and did they want to make
an issue of bureaucratic control.

The Commander expressed the opinion that
sitting unarmed on a carpet in the S^ara under
the probable surveillance of enemy agents was
inconceivably reckless and that we were restricted
to quarters.

I said that we had a piece with us.

- Fuck off with your peace of mind said the
Commander,

14

Often it was sorrowful to be with E.G. and sense
our mutual dilemma. We were both charismatic
shamans now trapped by our images. Age and
isolation were handicaps. E.G. was thirty-five. He
had spent nine years in prison, two years as a
public figure running for the presidency of the
United States, and two years in exile. Thus oc-
cupied he had no chance to bang around in the
new creative chaos, remain open to the new
electronic freedom of thought, reel in reaction to
the humbling insight that everything is changing
fast, that the old dogmas are dead. A new genera-
tion was taking over, skeptical, tolerant, erotic,
disillusioned with the old politics, demanding
honesty and open consciousness. No one could
talk back to him. I knew the problem.

Whatever our past achievements, it seemed ob-
vious that Algiers was a backwater retirement
village, far removed and basically irrelevant to
what was happening in America. This fact was
hard for both of us to accept. At times in our bitter
nostalgia it seemed that we divided the world in
our resentments. Most of our energies actually
entered on and around the women who loved us,
whose growing energies we both lovfed and feared.

214 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

What She and Kathleen did and felt and learned is
the important story still to emerge from Algeria.

I tried halfheartedly to pass on the Weathermen
hope that Eldridge could create in Algiers a center
for dissident voices. God knows that many in
America were praying that a broad, unified move-
ment could emerge. Other refugee political groups
in Algiers shared the same wish.

One night we met the Brazilian hijackers at
a fish restaurant near the Place des Martyrs. They
were noble men and women who had resisted a
police state, kidnapped officials and planes; won
the release of their imprisoned. We honored them.
They replied modestly that what is done in Brazil
is trivial heroics. Even if we were to overthrow
Brazilian fascism it would mean nothing. Ameri-
can imperialism is an octopus with tentacles all
over the world. You and the Panthers have fought
the enemy directly and survived. We have no
voice. The world is not interested in what we say.
You and Cleaver have access to the media. Rose-
mary and I found this sobering.

When we talked to E.G. about this conversation
he scolded us for talking to strangers. I urged him
to meet with other international revolutionaries,
make the embassy a focal point and broadcast
center for liberation groups. Announce that we
are a wild, varied fanatic collection of many tribes.
It's an electronic jihad. Diversity is our strength.

Dig the proud Panthers.

Dig the Puerto Rican Lords seizing empty ghetto
churches for homeless kids.

Dig the Ghicanos strong as obsidian knives re-
sisting the Gentral Valley ranchers.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 215

Dig the hippie with the wilted rose in his dyed
blond hair, cheap Moroccan cotton wrapped around
his emaciated body. Proust would ha:Ve liked him.

Dig the dark-haired Italians sitting in Milan-
ese Castello-Sforzeca-Visconti Marxist positions
around the elegantly decorated rooms on the Via
Puccini.

Dig the gay liberation platoons in turtlenecked
sweaters fighting the pohce in the Village bars.

Dig the dope dealers moving among the young
to loosen up the old structures.

Dig the rock star minstrels singing about Viet-
nam.

Dig the Black Nationalists and the Muslims in
storefront restaurant temples.

Dig the middle-class ecology freaks sabotaging
smokestacks.

Dig the Indians firing arrows at Coast Guard
cutters from the shores of Alcatraz.

Most important, dig the flowering of emanci-
pated women everywhere.

Dig the hard-nosed androgyne-looking, sexy in
a curious way ASTA German student leaders de-
nouncing in shrill voices imperialism.

Dig pudgy Geismar storming delicatessen shops
in Maoist happening shouting - Fuck perfumed
Paris and get down to the harsh realities of Re-
nault workers.

Invite them all here to shout on our Radio Free
Algeria network. Open it up. The media is the
method.

But Eldridge was socially timid, ill at ease in any
situation where scowling muscle couldn't domi-
nate. He was afraid it would get out .of hand.

216 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

Back at the hotel, an easy routine had devel-
oped. The beach village was small and jve^ became
friendly with the hotel staff, shopkeepers, and
officials. Mornings, I would walk across the small
square to the restaurant, drink strong coffee mixed
with hot milk, and eat sugared rolls with butter
and rich jam. Then Shg would come dancing
across the square, sparkling with teen-age delight.

Often, the hotel manager would come over to
sit with us. His name was Khali. He was a Kabyle,
a Berber from the mountains; handsome, proud,
disdainful of the coast Arabs. Khali kept inviting
us to his village in the mountains where his wife
and children lived. He would talk softly of his
hfe at home: his dog, his cows, his gun for hunt-
ing, his wife who was good, docile, and obedient.
Like everyone else, he had fought in the Revolution
and once, after too much wine, he described the
murder of his father by the French. Then he pulled
up his shirt and showed us the scars on his side.
This experience was not unusual, although Khali
soon proved to be. Often in moments of intimacy,
Algerians would slowly and solemnly narrate their
war experiences. Often they would weep in mem-
ory of love sacrificed.

Khali knew Cleaver, too, for he had lived at the
hotel. We sensed something protective and almost
worried in his attitude toward us. He said that
when the Panthers first came to Algiers there was
intense interest in this small group of warriors
who stood up single-handed against America.

- At first the Panthers acted frightened and
confused and that was understandable after what

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 217

they had been through. But then they shut them-
selves in their villas and their rented cars like
European businessmen. - They never came out
to meet the people. No Panther has ever been seen
in a village or talking quietly in a cafe. It is felt
that the Panthers do not like the Black and Brown
people of Africa. They are afraid of us and avoid
our friendship. They do not sit with us. They
cover their fear with aggressive actions. It is often
that way.

Before I left Khali looked at me and said three
words in Arabic. He had me pronounce the words
several times and said that if I were ever in danger
and needed help to shout these words in a loud
voice.

The move from the beach hotel to the city
apartment was to happen the week before Christ-
mas. Olga, a friend of the Panthers, had located it
for us. Two bedrooms in a high cluster of apart-
ments built by the French and now taken over by
the Algerian Government.

The move involved some delicate intrigue.
There was a housing shortage. Socialist rents were
low, but we had to pay a two-thousand-doUar fee
to the departing tenants, an Algerian engineer and
his French wife bored with Algeria, nervously
starting a new hfe in Paris. The transaction was
illegal. If news of the switch were to leak, the
concierge or any other tenant could move another
family in ahead of us. We heard ominous stories
of vacated apartments being forcibly occupied by
defiant squatters. It was arranged that we would
move in the night before the tenant^ left.

218 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

We were happy about having a real home.
Harassed and on the run, we had been without a
space of our own for two years. We had never lived
together in a city and were prepared to make the
most of the experience.

An emerging money crisis did not ease the
transaction. Shortly after our arrival in Algeria a
leftist friend had arranged through contacts in the
publishing business an advance of $7,500 for
writing a book. I promised to give Eldridge two
thousand. Just before we moved from the beach
hotel the Commander and his assistant came out
to visit. They began to press for bread, implying
that I was holding out. The Commander placed
his black attache case on the table and his pistol
fell out with a clatter. I told them that when the
money came they would be paid.

The next day at the embassy the mail included
a notice from the bank. The money had arrived.
The envelope had been opened. I received ques-
tioning looks. - The money has arrived I said
cheerfully.

I drove to the bank and returned to the embassy
with two thousand dollars in dinars. The assistant
counted it and said when will we get the rest that
you owe us.

When we arrived at the apartment the engineer
asked if he could stay with us for a few days. The
government, unhappy about emigrating engineers,
was holding up his exit visa. He was an intelligent
person, easy to live with.

The second night in town Eldridge dropped by.
Ariana was with him. She has been discussed in
the Panther press but they did not mention that

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 219

she was also beautiful, olive skin, almond eyes,
a brave, wise nineteen-year-old girl, very much in
love with E.G.

He closed the living-room door, walked to the
balcony, checked the view, and asked if there was
a rear door. He rolled a joint. Ariana looked around
and asked if there was a bath or a shower.

We heard a key turn in the outside door and the
sound of the tenant in the entrance hall. E.G. was
on his feet hand reaching for his belt. Eldridge
wanted to know when he would leave. He men-
tioned that he was going to visit the FLN offices
the next day. They wanted to talk to him about
some problems concerning us. I did not believe
him. He said if we had done anything that he
didn't know about, now was the time to confess.

During the Ghristmas hoUdays a short time
thereafter, wg^ asked Eldridge to drop down with
Kathleen but he said that they didn't recognize
Ghristian religious holidays and that they would
be down after the tenant left.

Meanwhile, disturbing news came from our
agent. He expressed no interest in the first four
chapters I had sent. He stressed that changes in
the American radical climate had made our posi-
tion less defensible. He implied that we might be
found politically unacceptable, and forced to leave
Algeria. He was in close touch with the New York
Panther Twenty-one. He said that they were all-
out martyrs who knew that they would never be
free from prison until the armed revolution suc-
ceeded. They had no patience with the cultural,
revolution.

220 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

My manuscript apparently displeased everyone.
The message from Algeria was not the strong voice
of unity and love out of frustrated complaint. The
agent reported that no more money was left from
the advances he received and no income from
other sources was anticipated.

At this point we felt the fkst flicker of The
Terror. The exile blues. No passport. No money.
No home.

Back in the USA we could deal with negative
reactions floating through acid holes in the huge,
loose, polymorphous system. When bread ran short
we could escape to the mountains or find an SDS
campus group that would sponsor a guerrilla
lecture and split the gate. Living in the demimonde
of dealers, forest dropouts, activists, jugglers,
show-biz magicians money was shared as com-
munal energy.

But all that affluent American security was
gone now. We were stranded light-years away in
the socialist world, income gone. Cleaver pressing
for payments. When I visited the embassy the
Brothers would mutter demands for that ten thou-
sand dollars.

The tenant was to leave our apartment on the
eighth of January, a Friday, y^ planned a small
dinner celebration for Saturday night. We invited
Eldridge and Ariana and Bella and Ali and Olga.
E.C. said he'd think about it.

Friday morning Eldridge called me to the em-
bassy and said that he had news from the FLN.
They were distressed that we were living inde-
pendently from military discipline. It was their
wish that members of revolutionary exile groups

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 221

be kept under supervision. The Algerian Govern-
ment couldn't tolerate the looseness of our life-
style. Etc. etc. Therefore it was necessary that a
Panther agent live with us to keep us under ob-
servation. And vice versa.

Eldridge knew that I knew that he was just
being polite. He smiled and said that we could
work it out. He would make it easy for us by
assigning to Ariana the task of living with us. It
would work well, he said, because he planned to
spend more time with us now that we were in the
city and we could hang out together and share
ideas.

It was a poignant moment. He said that he
sensed that we had been lonely for closer contact
and that now it would be possible. I said that Td
run it through my head and talk to her, about it.
It was agreed that Eldridge and Ariana would
drop by that afternoon to discuss the matter
further.

When I told her about the proposal, sh^sighed.
Tonight wouldlSave been the first time in two
years that we'd be home alone together. We were
touched by the ojBFer. We felt the yearning and
love for Eldridge. We were with him in risky exile.
We felt the attraction of the polarity. If we could
connect, the possibilities were exponential. But
we resented the flavor of bondage. We didn't dig
being commanded to turn on with tTie^Bng.

Eldridge didn't show up. Ariana came with thi^e
suitcases. She shrugged and said there's nothing
to talk about. I've been ordered to live here. It's
my job.

Bella and Ahmed were due to come by for

222 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

another megalomaniac drunken tape session. She
didn't like the vibrations so I decided to take the
guests out to a restaurant. I asked Ariana to come
and to invite Eldridge.

At the restaurant, Ahmed drank wine from my
glass to avoid being seen drinking alcohol. E.G.
didn't show. During dinner I told Bella that I'd
like to talk to the FLN to protest living under
surveillance and to arrange to leave the country
if they really insisted on it. Bella looked pale.
Ahmed choked on my wine. Ariana quietly left
to make a phone call.

Ariana slept on the hving-room couch that night.

The next morning in preparation for the dinner
She went to the market with Ariana. Ariana saw
Kathleen coming down the aisle and fled. Whew I
Bella called and said that Ahmed was going to
Constantine to inspect a steel factory and they
wouldn't show for dinner. I asked Bella about
Hamid, a young Algerian diplomat who had stopped
me on the avenue to talk about mutual friends
in New York. He offered friendship, hashish, and
new rock tapes. Bella laughed. Hamid is the jolliest
man in Algeria. He's all right. He's frivolous but a
good revolutionary. You can trust him. I told her
5iat we planned to invite him to the dinner.

All afternoon Fatima, the maid who came with
the apartment, happily cooked couscous. She liked
us. Ariana left at jftve. She said she wouldn't be
bSck for dinner. At 7:30 Eldridge phoned. I asked
if he was coming to dinner. He inquired about the
guest list, then laughed and said he didn't think
he could deal with that.

15

At five minutes to eight I was in the study typing
this book. The doorbell rang.JShe^ came into the
study with a funny look on Her face and said a
bunch of Panthers were in the living room wanting
to talk to me. The Commander and three assist-
ants. His manner was stem. They had come to
take us down to the Pointe Pescade apartment
where we had been held under house arrest with
the Yippies. I pointed out that dinner guests were
expected in five minutes and that an awkward
situation would develop. We'll come down to Pointe
Pescade later tonight or tomorrow. This dinner
isn't going to take place, said the Commander,
there are people coming and things going down
that we just can't allow. I was embarrassed by the
paranoia.^ It is important that we think logically,
I said. We^ met Olga through the Panthers. I
checked out Hamid. If you have any worries why
don't you stay for dinner. Then afterward we'll go
to Pointe Pescade or hang around for ten minutes
and I'll explain to them that an emergency has
arisen. But do not let us create a situation which
we will all come to regret. The four Panthers moved
in around me. I'm not going to argue with you,
said the Commander. Jfou two will come either
willingly or by force. I got a clear prevision and it

224 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

scared me. You're making a mistake, I said. We
can do anything we want, said the Commander. I
demanded to talk to Eldridge on the phone. Re-
fused. I demanded to talk to Huey. The four Pan-
thers moved closer. I shrugged and walked into the
kitchen. They're trying to kidnap us. Can't they
wait until after dinner. She said. There is enough
couscous for everyone. The Panthers crowded into
the small kitchen. The Commander moved quickly
to the sink and grabbed a small paring knife with
a leer of efficient triumph. He made me feel dis-
armed somehow. Get going, said the Commander,
we don't want to hurt you. I'm not going, I said.
Huey Newton taught us to resist, I said in a slow
and clear voice. The Commander nodded and three
Panthers grabbed me. I pulled away and began
shouting for help in Arabic as Khali had taught
me. Two Panthers grabbed my arms, twisting me
down. I was on the floor with one Panther, hand
on my mouth, another twisting my arm behind my
back. My nose was bleeding, ghe^was shouting
don't let them hurt you. The pressure on my arm
tightened. Will you come quietly, hissed the Com-
mander. I nodded assent. They ordered Hen to get
Her coat. They were well trained. Holding my arms
Ihey moved me to the door. They must have
practiced. Use the stairs, said the Commander,
the guests will be coming up the elevator. Two
Panthers shoved me down the stairs. When we
reached the courtyard they told me to walk quietly
to the car. Any noise and well vamp on you both.
I walked across the deserted courtyard, a Panther
holding each of my arms. I kept praying that the
dinner guests would show up on time. A Panther

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 225

car was waiting by the gate. I refused to leave the
courtyard until She came. There were some Alge-
rian kids playing around the car. The Panthers
glanced at each other and stopped. After a while
She appeared flanked by the Commander and the
"otner guard. We looked at each other and shook
our heads slowly. They forcedHer in the middle of
the front seat and I was shoved in the rear.

They held my arms behind my back and hustled
us in the Pointe Pescade apartment. The Com-
mander smiled at us. Well you're really busted this
time. There's no bail, no phone call, and no lawyer.

- You told me I could talk to Eldridge when we
get there.

- Eldridge wiU talk to you at his convenience,
said the Commander.

S^were moved to the corner of the long Uving
room, where we sat on mattresses. yVe jooked at
each other. This'is a scary movie, She^said. Many
possibilities were spinning through our heads. Like
number one ; Did the Algerian Government know
what was happening? They could have waited
until after the dinner party. They don't have to
bother to keep it secret. Cleaver could have told
anything about us to justify revolutionary dis-
ciphne. We ^ remembered the rumors about the
famous Brother who mysteriously disappeared and
the Commander's ominous reference to what was
worse than prison. On the wall there was a poster
picture of Malcolm X above the quote "We will
stop at nothing to reach our goal."

Four Panthers sprawled on mattresses watching
us. We. sat facing each other, looking into each
other's eyes. We_^tarted talking about Flo and

226 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

Maynard Ferguson and funny memories from Mill-
brook. We were high on love ignoring our captors.
There was a bustle at the door and a young white
man, Jewish-looking, with a wild flaring Afro hair-
style entered the room. He was carrying a video
camera. He looked at us and shook his head sor-
rowfully. After a brief conversation with the Com-
mander he moved close and started filming us. I
sent him an unfriendly message. We continued
talking. He moved to get closeups of Her face. She^
turned Hey back to the camera. It's getting pretty
insane, S|^e. said. Maybe they want documentary
proof that we were alive before they off us. The
cameraman was standing looking down at us with
a sad face, I sent him a rejection message and he
turned away.

Two guards remained. They kept looking out the
windows. It was a thirty-foot drop. One guard
said - Don't move from that maftress. If you want
to get to the John ask permission. Try anything
funny and we'll vamp on you. We lay in each
other's arms whispering about escape possibihties
and wondering how we could get messages out.
Hamid and Olga would know something was
amiss. But maybe they are intimidated by the Pan-
thers.

In the morning the guards let Hei; make coffee
and wg^ ate fruit. They ignored my requests to talk
to Eldridge. The hours passed slowly. In the after-
noon the room filled with guards. We were to be
moved. Our hopes that we would be taken home
were disconnected by the nervous security mea-
sures. We were herded to the door. Ominous warn-
ings were issued. She was bustled into one car and

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 227

I was pushed into another. The Panthers were
nervous. I was sitting in the rear between two
guards. As we roared away one guard said - Hey
man, the trunk of the car is open. The driver
turned his head back to look. The car was speeding
dovni a two-lane highway jammed with Sunday
traffic. The road curved but we were hurtling
straight ahead toward the line of Algerian fam-
ihes. In one second a j&ve-car accident would pile
up. The police would be called. Sirens. Ambulances.
None of the Panthers spoke French or Arabic. I
could appeal to the police for rescue with Khali's
words. It was a millisecond decision. I felt love
for the young, frightened rookies. The accident
would cause a terrible racial scandal. Algerian
families would be injured in the crash. I would
have let a white police car crash. I shouted - Look
out man. With perfect reflex the driver swung the
car inches away from the startled Algerian Sunday
drivers. There was a moment of silence. The
driver said, - Who was that who shouted Look
out man I The driver glanced back. - You lucky
you shouted. You really saved your ass. Racing at
reckless Panther speed we swung into Tenampa,
the notorious slum neighborhood where lower-class
Europeans had hved before independence. We
parked in front of some broken-down tenements.
There were many Arabs in the street. I considered
making a break and shouting the help mantras.
But we have a taboo about caUing the police. And
I was feeling more and more protective of the
scared bluffing boys playing dehnquent games. We,
were pushed into a shabby apartment which ob-
viously had not been lived in. I reinembered hear-

228 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

ing talk of a new pad. We^ were moved into a
second-floor back room. There was a bed and a
mattress. The floor was piled with the litter of
former tenants. She stood by the locked door while
I went to the window. It was an easy ten-foot drop
to the neighboring roof. The room was freezing.
Veejay down on the mattress. Body warmth is
comforting in times of stress. After a while a key
turned in the door. A guard came in and began
pulling at our mattresses. He motioned for us to
rise. I complained about the bitter cold. He agreed
and said he was trying to score some heaters. He
was a good man. It was all love contorted by El-
dridge and me. He opened the window and looked
down at the back courtyard, his eyes estimating
the jump. Don't try anything funny. We ain't
fooling with you no more, he said. I asked for
blankets. We could hear noises in the hall of
moving furniture. It sounded as though they were
preparing for a long stay. We^ huddled together
and loved each other. We^ wondered how we could
get a message out. We wondered what Olga and
Hamid would think and what they could do. We
remembered that Michael Zwerin, the European
editor of the Village Voice, was arriving in Algiers
that evening to visit us, Eldridge had expressed
interest in meeting him. No ominous possibiUty
could be rejected. Toward the evening w^ were
ordered out of the room, down the stairs, and into
a car. She was in front and I was flanked in the
rear seat. We started driving toward the center of
. the city, past the Grande Poste up Avenue Muham-
mad Cinq. We were hoping that we were to be

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 229

returned home but the car roared on by and pulled
up In front of another Panther apartment. It was
like the California prison system flying me around
from one prison to another with no explanation.

The next jail was luxurious. The rent, I recall,
was seven hundred a month. We were ordered to
a mattress on the floor of the warm carpeted living
room. More ominous warnings were issued. Around
ten o'clock the apartment opened and a guard
came in carrying two pots.^We were called to the
dining room. One pot contained barbecued ribs
which the two guards ate. They pointed to the
second pot. It contained boiled pigs' feet. We ^ ate
fruit and bread.

We lay on the mattress. One guard slept facing
us in an easy chair in the dining room so that he
looked at us from the bottom of the door. They
had notebooks and seemed to be writing down
everything we said. Pairs of eyes solemnly watched
us as we huddled together under our coats and
dif ted off into sleep in each other's arms.

- I wonder what happened to Michael Zwerin,
She murmured.

In the morning, the guards said that Shp could
go to the kitchen to make coffee. Then they told
Hereto wash the dishes. She looked at the guard
and said that She^would wash the cups we had
used but that She would not work for pigs. It was
all love twisted into knots.

We heard people entering the apartment. The
Commander came into the living room. A hip-
looking white man was with him. ^She looked up
and exclaimed in pleasure.

230 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

- Michael ZwerinI Far out!

- What's far out, he said. Weren't you expect-
ing me?

- Not here. She said. We've been kidnapped.

- We are glad to see you.

The Commander was standing at the doorway.

- Tell Eldridge I want to talk to him.

- When the time comes, the Commander said.
Zwerin sat down with us on the floor and re-
counted the story of his arrival.

Zwerin had been disappointed that we were
not at the airport as promised, nor did we answer
our phone. He took a taxi and rang our bell. No-
body home. He checked his bags with the con-
cierge and pinned a note to the door . . . taking
a promenade. Back in an hour.

An hour later another note was pinned where
his had been. Call 78-21-05 and identify yourself.
Because he thought the note was our joke he
dreamed up some comic identities — not realizing
it was serious — finally hitting on the Fox, after our
mutual friend Maynard Ferguson, who used to be
known that way around Birdland.

- Hell, is Tim there?

- Timothy Leary? An Afro-American accent.

- That's right.

- Fm sorry, he's occupied at the moment. Who
is this?

He identified himself for real, no Fox, no place
for jokes.

- You'll have to find a hotel.
It was approaching midnight.

- Hey, tell Leary 111 sleep by his door until he
gets home.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 231

The voice checked something out.

- I doubt very much that Mr. Leary will be
home tonight. Til help you find a hotel.

Ten minutes later a tall Black man with a fringe
beard pulled up in a Renault sedan. He drove fast
through the town, deserted at this hour, twisting
and turning through the narrow side streets,
blinking yellow lights. He double-parked by a
downtown hotel, made sure the price was right,
and helped Zwerin register in French. No ques-
tions asked, no explanation given. He said he'd call
back in the morning.

At seven thirty the call came.

- Hello. I picked you up yesterday. If you can
get ready right away, FU take you to Leary.

First they collected the bags from the concierge.
The Panther helped Zwerin carry them. Zwerin
thanked him, perhaps too profusely.

They drove up hills discussing exile, and parked
by a handsome two-story white villa with bronze
plaque on the gate: BLACK PANTHER PARTY
INTERCOMMUNAL SECTION.

A familiar face was at the top of the stairs,
beardless and barbered.

- Do you know Leary? asked Eiaridge.

- No, his wife, said Zwerin.

- Would She, recognize you?

- Sure.

- Did you bring gifts for them?

- Yes.

- Just lay them out on the couch there.
Michael had heard of the Panther customs and

expected a body search and photographs. He did
not object considering Bobby Hutton, Fred Hamp-

232 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

ton, and all the others offed by people of white com-
plexion. Michael stacked the following items : one
pair of double-bed sheets, one pair corduroy jeans,
purple, size 33-33, one bar of lemon soap, five
cassette tapes including George Harrison, Bob
Dylan, John Lennon, the Band, and Bilhe Holiday,
one fifth duty-free Cutty Sark, miscellaneous un-
derground papers, two copies of The Silent Needle,
a book about Black junkies and their rehabilitation
by Michael himself.

- I wish we had the lemon soap now_She said.
Cleaver asked a young man who had been read-
ing quietly in the corner to leave the room.

- Do you have any dope or weapons, he asked.
Zwerin said no.

- Wait a few minutes and well take you to
Leary, said Cleaver.

The Commander drove Michael down the hill,
honking fiercely. The Commander did not help
Michael with his bags. Two locks unbolted from
the inside. A sullen face appeared as the door
opened a crack.

- And here I found you, said Zwerin. You need
a shave and She needs vitamins and a steak.

The three of us settled down into stories about
mutual friends, marveling at the overlapping syn-
chronicities in our experience. Michael glanced
at the two somber Panthers sitting in the next
room.

- In this jail the prisoners are having more fun
than the guards.

One of the guards was reading Mao. The other
leafing his way through a stack of Black Panther
newspapers. Iliey rarely talked.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 233

Michael thought that our jail was actually a
pleasant place if you ignored the fact that the door
was locked and that we had to ask permission to go
to the toilet or open a window. We asked Michael
if he had read The Magus, by John Fowles.

At 6:30 in the evening the phone rang and
Michael was called to answer. He told us that it
was Eldridge who had asked him not to come to
any conclusions about what was happening until
they had a chance to talk. Eldridge said that they
would meet in the morning, that Michael could
come and go as he pleased but that he would have
to go to the embassy before returning. It was all
right for him to spend the night with us.

Michael was pleased by the phone call. He said
Cleaver sounded friendly and reasonable. We
glanced at each other the way prisoners some-
times do.

- Whatever happened to Amelia Earhart, I
asked.

Actually we were relieved that Michael was
being allowed this freedom. It added a level of
protection. We^gave him a list of people to con-
tact in case he was not allowed to return. Left
lawyers in America, radical friends, Huey Newton.

- Don't worry promised Michael, I won'J: leave
Algeria until you are safe.

Zwerin showed us a copy of New York magazine,
which contained an article about the New Haven
Panther trial. There was a chilling quote from
Stokely Carmichael : "The present tactics the party
is using to coerce everyone to submit to its author-
ity .. . the demands for loyal and unquestioning
followers rather than critical colleagues . . . will

234 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

lead the BPP to become at worst, a tool or racist
imperialists, used against the Black masses/' The
article was biased against the Panthers. It told a
story of fanaticism, torture, and terror.

Michael started to get a little worried. It was
contagious. I asked him what he thought of the
Panthers.

- They are plain lonely, he said. Without
women. Watch how they read Time magazine.
They miss America. They must miss their sisters
here in this puritanical country where women
wear veils on their wedding night. They must
resent your closeness, your exclusiveness, your
whiteness. You must appear to them as some sort
of aristocracy, beautiful people, dilettantes in some
jive-ass cultural revolution having httle to do
with their problems.

We three people slept on the floor until late
the next morning. Michael laughed when we
awoke.

- Fve just had my best night's sleep in months
in the custody in the company of a bunch of
felons, hijackers, bail jumpers, and alleged mur-
derers, ril take a revolutionary bust anytime, he
said.

— ,Wp g greed.

Michael said that he would leave now to check
into a hotel and then meet Eldridge. I sat down
to write a letter for him to take to E.G. It was
a civil rights message protesting arrest without
specific accusation. Michael read it and said it was
too mild. I figured that the terror had made me
docile so I rewrote a Tom Paine strong demand.

It was one of those long slow prison waits for

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 235

Michael to return. We had an uneasy feehng.
Zwerin had become our lawyer and our jury. We
had tried to present our defense to him, knowing
that Eldridge, as prosecuting DA and presiding
judge, would have his own official version of our
crimes and make his own ruling.

Just around midnight the jury returned with
the verdict. We leaped up and greeted him with
enthusiasm. His attitude had changed. He was
no longer a fellow prisoner, sharing our fear and
outrage. He was jaunty, cheerful, confident. A con-
genial handball partner of the judge.

He smiled reassuringly.

- Well first of all you'll be freed tomorrow.

- Tomorrow we exclaimed in unison. Why
not now? '

He ignored our question.

- And second, he said, you made a terrible
mistake in writing that letter to Eldridge. It made
him furious and he almost decided not to free
you.

The remark blew my sanity. It was Zwerin who
had urged me to take the strong stand. His switch
was disturbing. Eldridge had got to him. It was
heavy magic.

Michael then began a moraHstic lecture telling
us that we had been irresponsible; that Algiers
was filled with CIA spies, that Eldridge was elo-
quent— what force, what clarity — that w§ would
have to mend our ways. A guard sat by the door
taking careful notes on the results of the experi-
ment.

We^ asked Michael to specify what crimes we
had committed. He spoke of our going to the

236 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

desert in full view of enemy agents without author-
ization. Then he began talking about two Amer-
ican oilmen who were on the plane with him from
Paris and the pervasiveness of American influence
in the Third World. He said that if we wanted to
square things with E.G. we should issue a state-
ment about the dangers of LSD.

- Don't moralize, man, just tell us what hap-
pened. Prisoners tend to get irritable under such
circumstances.

- Well Eldridge read the letter and then handed
it to the Commander. As usual sounds were coming
from the speakers. The Rolling Stones were sing-
ing "Two thousand light-years from home" which
I thought appropriate. Cleaver said, Well I accept
his deadline. He won't be released today. You are
free to do what you want, but I strongly advise
you not to call anyone in the Algerian Government.
If you are interested in the Learys' welfare, that
is. You can call anyone you like, see. But you are
not in possession of all the facts.

E.G. wanted to know what "sic" meant. I told
him and he nodded. Cleaver said that your letter
was so stupid that he wouldn't even bother to ex-
plain to me about the reasons for the bust. The
Commander said, Leary should have his ass kicked
for this letter. I wondered about your fate should
Cleaver leave. Cleaver said that you don't reahze
how serious your position is. He said that you
don't reahze how the Panthers are protecting you,
the only protection you have. You may consider
yourself in jail here but Eldridge says he is trying
to keep you from going back to prison in Babylon.
Your position in Algeria is far from secure. Xmer-

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 237

lean business interests are pressuring the Al-
gerian Government, which needs dollars, to cease
granting refuge for American poHtical exiles. The
Algerians are tightrope walking between Chinese,
Russian, and American interests and the hbera-
tion movements from Brazil, Angola, the Canary
Islands, and Babylon itself. Although the Panthers
have been well treated there is reactionary pres-
sure from within the bureaucracy. Particularly
against you. Former freedom fighters are in prison
for dope smoking. Women are terribly repressed.
Workers are poorer than before the revolution.
Students are unhappy. You have to watch your
steps in this Third World power. Eldridge must put
security before everything. One thing gone wrong
could blow everything. Eldridge said he had to
use a lot of political capital to keep you here and
that he's not abandoning you now. He's behind
you. He's prepared to go down with you. But not
for some jive reason.

I asked if I could write about this. Eldridge
said OK but they might have to react to my article
with a policy statement about the question of gun
versus dope. He said I should go back to my hotel
and we'd arrange an interview with me and you
in a couple of days.

After Zwerin left we^ stood with dazed expres-
sions on our face. That Eldridge is a heavy magi-"
cian, she said. It was a scary moment, like the
LSD panic when all former reality gets swept
away and^the logic of one's former life is seen as
crazed subjective delusion. If E.C. could persuade
Zwerin, sympathetic old friend, fellow religionist,
hbertarian intellectual, that our kidnapping was

<

238 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

justified, then certainly his eloquent magic could
convince the nonpsychedelic Algerian police and
the radical constituency which Zwerin repre-
sented. The possibility that we were irresponsible
lunatics or helpless victims of sorcery must be
considered.

^^^Wg, recalled the warnings of our agent-friend
about shifts in political thinking and the cutting
of our economic lifelines by displeased radical
editors. We^recalled the fact that we had not heard
from our comrades in the Weathermen Under-
ground and also certain facts about white slavery.
Perhaps American left politics had taken a turn
toward ruthless violence while we went on bleating
about Aim for Life.

The spell cast on Zwerin could not be easily
dismissed. \^ had gravely misjudged the situa-
tion, underestimated the dangers, both physical
and psychic. Before Zwerin's return we had feared
for our lives, but now we questioned our sanity.

At noon the next day the Commander brusquely
ordered us to leave and escorted us to a car.
Driving home he told us that the apartment had
been searched, our money was in an envelope in
the desk, and that they had confiscated pui; pass-
ports and all the dope they could find. - You stay
in your pad and don't try any bullshit. Youll
be contacted when Eldridge wants to see you.

It was eerie to be back in the silent apartment.
The couscous had been eaten and ^gir^ bed slept
in. Ariana greeted ug^with Soviet impersonality
and watched us from the sofa, ^eialked in glances
knowing we were being listened to. We walked

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 239

around like robots in a science-fiction horror flick,
I was not happy to recall the hours of prophetic,
megalomaniac, visionary babbhng relentlessly re-
corded on Bella's tape and hstened to by stem
revolutionary judges who would not be amused by
declarations that the real revolution, invisible,
neurological, erotic, sexual was occurring without
theoretical or tactical direction. Grandiose notions
about the seven revolutions would seem like dan-
gerous revisionism to Marxist wizard commissars,
who now controlled our destinies.

We were unclear about the ground rules of our
house arrest. We^ asked if it was legal for Michael
Zwerin to come over. Ariana phoned headquarters
and said it was OK. Michael seemed recovered
from his trance and hack to his witty, urbane
self, loving us, hoping that we'd turn him on. He
was eager to get me to talk in a tape recorder
about the seven revolutions. By this time Michael
was in top form, involved in an adventure, a lucky
journahst who had stumbled into the hippest
story since he ghostwrote the life of Christine
Keeler.

He was sitting in the study as we opened the
mail which had accumulated during our imprison-
ment. One envelope from San Francisco contained
four Christmas cards portraying a seated Buddha
holding in his hand an orange sunshine tab. It
was a gratuitous grace we figured. Ariana heard
us laughing and came in to see me popping a tab
in my mouth and Her doing the same. Shg handed
two cards to Ariana.

- Here's one for you and Eldridge. ^ — ^

After a while the four of us were sitting around

240 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

listening to music and joking about our situation
and the government surveillance. Ariana was
giggling and making jokes too. Later she cried
and said that she was all fucked up and didn't like
what she was doing but it was her job. She was
a lonely girl in love. Then we heard a honk from
down below and she ran to get her coat. As she
left we said - Tell Eldridge anything you want but
tell him that we wish he was here with us.

During the long night the gravity of our situa-
tion became clear. We^ were without passports or
money. We were fugitives, our only connection
with the Algerian Government being the Panthers.
Wg^could have written to American friends for emo-
tional and financial support but for reasons which
now seem bewitched, ye^were unable to ask for
help. Gabriel, who had taken over leadership from
Aries, Was underground. The Weathermen were
out of sight, hunted by the FBI. There were many
loving friends who would have sent assistance but
the problem seemed beyond their strengths. JKe^
had constructed a new reality and we were stuck
with it. It seemed like spiritual cheating and a
regressive retreat to cry for help back to America.
We had left all that behind to join the new society.
The position was our unique creation and wejiad
^to solve it with new magic.

yVe had become the first oppressed minority
group, the first delinquents, the first mental cases,
the first helpless welfare cases in the new Black
state. We had to figure out a new solution to the
oldest problem. The experiment had gotten out
of hand again.

One possibility was to get others to join us in

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 241

the new world. We, talked to Zwerin about it. If
he admired Eldridge so much why didn't he stay
with us and help us work things out. He just
grinned and soon thereafter split for his hotel.

16

We^ heard the cocks crow and watched the sun
come up and then it was time for me to meet
Zwerin and report to the embassy for the inter-
view. I was feeling shaky. It was eighteen hours
since our release and I was to tape a debate with
the King, an unwinnable dilemma. If I were to
speak with eloquence Eldridge would simply con-
fiscate the tape and deal with my unrepentance
at his own leisure. There is no way for a prisoner
to win an argument with the parole board. It was
the Russian poet bind.

On another level it was a subtle initiation situa-
tion. When all was said and done, our four days
of captivity were considerably less than four
hundred years and we had been treated with a
stylish, professional courtesy that no white police
could manage. I couldn't fight against Blacks but
I couldn't play out the old pattern of slavery either.

At the embassy we were coldly informed that
E.G. would be along in a while. I was ordered to
the recording studio to hsten to the tape which
E.G. had cut. First came a Rolling Stones sound.
A hip ambience thus established Gleaver's voice
began to speak with force and solemnity.

As I listened I recalled that Gleaver had already
sent a copy of the tape to the American radio

244 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

Stations and suddenly realized that our kidnapping
was part of an overall tactic on Cleaver's part to
seize control of the militant revolution, to polarize
and separate the pohtical from the military, to
become toughest spokesman from the left. E.G.
had studied the script as it had been played out in
Russia, China, North Korea, Cuba, Algeria. De-
stroy the popular front, move in with ruthless
force. Eldridge was the new candidate for the
Kim II Sung club, the ehte clique of planetary
strongmen, heavyweight champions who have
fought their way to power. The poHtics of despair,
the ultimate power kick, the ecstatic pleasure of
the man who single-handedly controls a country,
sprawled astride leather saddle on the dome of
the presidential palace, finger on trigger, spray-
ing machine-gun tracer bullets at whim down the
avenues that lead to the orgasm center — that
exultant finger on the trigger. It's a familiar voca-
tional aspiration of the oppressed, despairing two-
thirds in the world where every adolescent boy has
listened to the ancient invitation. The techniques
for executing the miUtary take-over are as standard
as chess openings or football formations. There
are probably a hundred thousand men in the world
who dream and scheme about the violent steps
which lead to the top.

I left the recording room in a somber mood
and joined Michael who had been waiting in the
conference room. Eldridge arrived two hours late.
I think we were both surprised to find ourselves
shaking hands. He sat down and read his mail,
made a phone call, and then announced that the
interview would begin. Zwerin said with a smile

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 245

that he had a question to raise off the record.
Would it be possible for him to get back the grass
that had been confiscated. E.G. turned an un-
amused eye and said that it might be possible for
the grass to be turned over to the Algerian Govern-
ment as contraband seized from his luggage.
Somewhat meekly Michael began the interview.*

jhe^was waiting anxiously at the apartment.
She had wept during the morning and Ariana in-
effectively apologized. yVe^ went for a nervous
walk. We^elt surveyed. Ifs an eerie feehng; got
those police state blues. The city seemed drab
and dangerous.

Down on the avenue we saw Brian Barritt and
Liz and Davie sitting at a sidewalk cafe. We
shouldn't be seen talking to them in this state of
terror. They had been waiting a week and were
delighted to see us but we just waved and hurried
by shouting that wejd be back. Whew, that was
risky. Someone in a passing car could have seen
the furtive message to Brian and reported us. y^e^
dreaded another arrest. Eldridge had told Zwerin
that after all the first arrest wasn't so bad, we
were left together. The next time he wouldn't be
so considerate.

JWe doubled down side streets to avoid seeing
our good friends. We believed that it was immoral

♦The interviews in full appeared in Jan. ^28, Feb. 4, Feb.
11, 1971 issues of the Village Voice,

246 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

and dangerous to talk to anyone who was not in
the party. It was immoral because it was risky and
would betray faulty judgment caused by the ex-
cessive use of LSD,

17

The next few days were tense. Ariana watched
every move. She would spend hours in the bath-
room combing her hair with the door open so that
she could hear what we were saying in the study.
We would retreat to our bedroom, lock the door,
and lie together whispering and touching.^e knew
that it didn't make any difference what we said
or didn't say. Ariana met Eldridge every night to
report, and to please him she would have to pro-
duce something of interest. Who wants a spy who
never brings news of value?

Michael Zwerin was also around a lot. He had
mailed off his first article to the Village Voice, and
had consequently upset the Panthers by his analy-
sis of their relations with the Algerian Government.
Poor Michael was feehng the ambivalence ><5f
the joumahst-friend. He could not undersmnd
our lack of total enthusiasm about being such
newsworthy copy.

The next Sunday we^bussed out to the beach
hotel for lunch. The manager told us that an
American friend had checked in looking for us. W^
were surprised to find Cynthia, a Black girl mar-
ried to Milt Sweeney, a promoter from Los Angeles.
Milt was touring around Spain in a borrowed Fer-
rari. Cynthia was a friend of the Commander and

248 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

his wife. Cynthia was broke and delighted to
accept our invitation to come home, but puzzled
by our insistence on obtaining Panther permis-
sion. With American insouciance she sniffed that
no one had to give her permission to live with her
friends. ^^^ explained that we got four days in jail
for an unauthorized dinner and the penalties for
illegal houseguests could be heavier and if we
didn't like this sort of treatment ^^were legally
unable to leave Algeria.

Cynthia is a gentle, wise person. She began
weaving threads of trust between the Panthers
and us. To her it was a neighborhood misunder-
standing between a Black family on the block
and a white family that had just moved in. She
worked days at the embassy or in the children's
nursery. I would drive her up the hill in the
morning and drop her off. In the evening I would
park the car in front of the embassy and ring
the bell. One of the former prison guards would
look down on me from the balcony, nod, and press
the button which opened the gate. Scared, I would
walk inside the courtyard, into the Panther's cage.
I always carried an extra package of cigarettes in
case I was detained. Then Cynthia would come
running down the stairs joyous and loving and
my fears would seem ridiculous, another disturb-
ing symptom of my wobbly reahty.

Michael Zwerin confirmed the fact that El-
dridge had sent the tape to the USA. We were all
waiting for the response. Cleaver had tossed a
bomb into the American left and jgp wondered
what the explosion would produce.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 249

Bella was extremely tender tojjg during the
postbust period. She kept coming around with
presents and lent me her car when she went to
Paris. She implied that she deplored our treat-
ment. But she made light of it. She saw our
kidnapping as a fraternity house prank, a .good
psychodrama, an initiation into the club. Nowjve
were accepted as real comrades. She frankly
thought the whole thing was funny. She fervently
hoped that she would never see ^ looking so
scared and tired as we did the day we returned
from jail. The taped interviews continued, but now
I was a wary subject. I felt like a Soviet dissident
trying to explain and justify the "dropout revolu-
tion" in the U.S.A. for Pravda readership.

I asked Bella if the Algerian Government would
approve of Cleaver's taking the law into his hands
on their territory. I thought that she flinched at the
question, but she said that the Algerian Govern-
ment approved of Cleaver's militancy and disap-
proved strongly of drugs and hippies. She often
said that we wouldn't be in Algeria without
Eldridge and that Eldridge wouldn't be in Algeria
without her.

An accelerating financial problem fueled^ our
paranoia. Most of our close friends of the last"two
years were inaccessible outlaw revolutionists or
dope dealers on the run. Most of the rest were in
such delicatQ, states of surveillance that phone
calls or letters from fugitive Algeria would bring
unwanted attention and put them on disagreeable
lists. Bella said that every international phone call
was monitored by the Algerian Government, by the

250 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

French and by the Americans, and maybe others.
It seemed that the only persons we could ask for
help were lawyers and editors *of underground
papers. Three of them contacted our friends and
each wired three thousand dollars; none of which
ever arrived.

Jffie were thoroughly penniless. Our poverty was
shghtly relieved by the arrival oIlKe Sweeneys,
who proceeded to paper Algeria with rubber
checks. Milt told me that he would straighten out
our misunderstanding with the Panthers. He read
the second psychotic version of this book and im-
mediately pronounced it a million-dollar best
seller. Cleaver was pleased. It was understood that
I should work diligently to complete the book. The
Panther women relayed messages through Cynthia
that they would love to have Her join them at the
office or in the nursery. This was' exactly whatJShe
wanted to do but the pervasive presence of Ariana
in the house prevented easy contact with Kathleen
and threw off honesty. ,She felt badly about this
and never forgave Eldridge for the triple insult to
womanhood.

We wondered how we should handle our in-
evitable meeting with Olga and with Jolly Hamid.
We asked BeUa, who was now becoming our
channel to Eldridge, what we could say to them.
Her advice was not to seek them out, but not to
avoid them, to accept invitations but not to invite
them to our house. In due course ^^ met Olga on
the street. She was discreet. She had called the
Panthers the day after the bust and had been
told by them that we were all right but out of

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 251

touch. We were ill at ease in her living room.
There were no Blacks present and the conversation
was non-Black, nonrevolutionary. It seemed to be
dangerous to be in the presence of someone who
rattled on frivolously about her personal life and her
personal plans and her personal opinions. She was
so blatantly and breezily individuahstic. By this
time the continual surveillance had created a sheU
of guarded reticence around us. Olga was a
shrewd, sensitive, deeply occult woman who knew
exactly what was happening on the diplomatic
chessboard. With delicate tendrils of implication
she suggested that the Algerian Government did
not approve of the kidnapping, that certain offi-
cials were ready to help us, that American con-
sular offices sent sympathetic reassurance that
Nixon no longer wanted us extradited. Cleaver
was wanted because of the nature of his crime —
rape.

I reported these conversations to Bella, ad-
mitting frankly the attraction of Olga's positive,
cheery, free attitude as well as the fear provoked
by her pro- American comments.

On Sunday we took a bus to the beach at Ma-
drague. The hotel manager, KhaH, was especially
cordial. He had heard of pur troubles with Cleaver.
There was little excitement in the sedate, prudish
city and our arrest provided the scandal of the
season. The manager told us that our^f ate was a
common topic of joking conversation in the cafes.
You are well liked here, he said. Everyone in this
village watches you. They say ypu are quiet.

252 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

pleasure-loving people very much in love and there
is anger at the Panthers, who are also well known
to us.

He inquired about our living arrangements and
frowned to hear about our house arrest. He said
that the Algerians had watched closely what had
happened since our arrival. That we were under
the protection of the Algerian Government. That
Arab traditions of hospitality were involved. That
Cleaver had made three bad mistakes which had
insulted the Algerian spirit. First, he, a guest in
the country, had imposed his force and his law
on others. This was inexcusable. Secondly, he
boasted about this in the press making the insult
pubUc. KhaH smiled. - You know, after what the
Algerians have been through they are not im-
pressed with tough guys. We are too familiar with
fierce-talking revolutionary leaders who use the
arms we give them against their own people. The
third insult to Algeria is the affair with the Al-
gerian girl who has left her home and turned
against her own people.

You have been watched very carefully for four
months. Everything you have done is known by
several groups. Information is power here, as
elsewhere. Everything is known. Many things are
rumored. You have some enemies but they have
no evidence against you. It is known that you
smoke hashish in your home. This is no problem
since many of our philosophers and ministers do
the same, discreetly. You have one powerful friend
in the government. He came to your home once in
America with some of your rich friends from New
York. To avoid scandal he was introduced to you

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 253

as a Jewish lawyer. You did not know who he was,
yet you honored him and offered your hospitality
to him. He has told this story to the top men in the
government here and it brought them pleasure.
You will learn about the Arab sense of humor.
He said that your way of life was rather Arab. He
came incognito to your home because he did not
want to start the rumor that Algeria was supplying
you with hashish. It was he who intervened with
the government to get your political asylum after
the bunghng of your arrival here. Several powerful
Algerians have offered the protection of their
homes to you and your ^fe. Including the mayor
and police chief or the beach village where you
lived. Anytime you wish you can leave the apart-
ment where you are held captive and move to a
safe place under protection of the government.

Khali asked me why ;^ had not taken action to
protect ourselves against the Panthers. Why I had
not listened to his warnings and used the words
and contacts he had given me.

I explained that j^ were taken by surprise. I
spoke of the special choreographed relationship
that Blacks had created with Whites and Whites
with Blacks in America. And of the arrival of
Cynthia, the gentle Libran spirit, the Black flower
child who believed that psychedelic love and radi-
ance could heal the ancient wound, create a
rainbow-colored future. That patience was the
balm.

Khali filled the pipe and began speaking softly
about slavery which he said was the oldest and
most pervasive human social form., His perspec-
tive was strange and disturbing. He said that

254 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

genocide was the basic law of nature. He said
that the pine trees thrust and struggle wih the
oleander, and that the lion stalks the deer. Slavery
exists in various local forms of symbiosis at every
level of nature. He, however, seemed to see history
and evolution mainly in terms of slavery. Slavery
was to him a natural phenomenon like gravitation
or the changes of the seasons. Until very recently
every human being was either slave or slave master.
To him European civilization was of interest be-
cause it substituted machine slaves for human
slaves. That white colonists used machines to en-
slave native cultures was to him an ingenious
development. Human slavery' was too inefficient
for cold cUmates. He was amused at revolutionary
rhetoric about colonialism, since pohtics was
simply a matter of who was to be slave and who
master. Those who shout the loudest against white
coloniaUsm are those who desire to wield the lash
themselves. He was both entertained and con-
cerned about my blaming the whites for enslaving
the Blacks.

- African people in harmony with nature killed,
mutilated, and cannibalized their neighbors for
millennia. Most of Africa still follows this instinct.
Then came the Arabs who told my forebears not to
kill and mutilate the bodies of beautiful young
girls and boys but to sell them. What a revelation I
The Blacks who now live in America were originally
sold into bondage by Black Africans. There is
much lying about racism and slavery by dema-
gogues. Every living creature is a racist. You are
here in North Africa to experience slavery. That

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 255

is good. You cannot be free until you have escaped
both from slavery and slave mastery.

He lit the pipe again. We smoked and drank tea.
I knew he was deciding whether to tell me more.
- Did you know, he said, that less than a hundred
years ago there were twenty-five thousand white
Christian slaves in this city of Algiers? He smiled.

Ariana calls me into her room. She is naked
except for a band of black lace around her thighs.
She is holding the phone.

- Eldridge wants to talk to you.

She watches me watch her move around the
room, Ughting a cigarette and leaning back against
the cushions on her couch bed.

- Hey man you gotta come up here. There's a
big-shot holy man from India here to see you.

There is something amusing, almost patroniz-
ing in his voice. Ariana smiles and offers me a
cigarette. I join her on the couch.

Everyone is smiling when I arrive at the em-
bassy. They direct me into the waiting room.

- Your guru awaits you said Eldridge.

He was about forty-five, wild orange hair, dirty
madras cotton shirt, tattered cape, a leather bag,
sandals, mad ghnt in his eye. He was a Tarot card
stepped out of an R. Crumb underground comic.
The ultimate bedraggled middle-aged hippie. With
him was a young Black man from the Congo.

The Joker, for that was his name, said that he
started two months ago from Algeciras to visit me.
Spiritual people all over the world were disturbed
by my endorsement of revolutionary violence.

256 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

Perhaps I was under some spell. He had come to
rescue me.

A young Panther was standing in the corner
of the room with a video camera shooting the
scene. The film would perfectly illustrate E.C.'s
accusations. Dig the God of Acid holding court in
Algiers with a follower.

I looked into the camera and smiled wearily.
I explained in a slow and distinct voice' about
racism, genocide, and self-defense; that we di-
rected no violence against innocent persons but
that we would resist the machines that were de-
stroying us and all free life. The cameraman was
sending me encouraging smiles and making right-
on motions.

The Joker then shifted the conversation. He
pulled out documents from his leather bag. He was
filing a lawsuit with the United Nations. He was
English with an Indian passport. The laws against
hashish and marijuana were violating the religious
rights of Hindus. He wanted me to join him in
this litigation. He would go back to London and
work through the EngHsh courts to free me. He
pulled out more documents. They concerned his
litigation against the Marine Engineers Union and
a steamship company for blacklisting him. He had
exposed a plot to sink a ship for the insurance and
now he could not get signed on any ships. The
Panther moved in for close-ups.

I explained that I could not join him in seeking
recourse from British law. We here in this embassy
are exiles, fugitives from Western law. We have
chosen to live under socialist law. We shall over-

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 257

throw these repressions but not by legal means.
We are outside that system, do you understand?

I asked Oscar, the young man from the Congo,
about his trip. He was hitchhiking to Europe to
make money so he could go to America and study
in a university to learn things that he could bring
back to his country to help his people. He asked
the Panthers which American university they
would recommend.

I gently reminded him that the Panthers were
out to smash the entire American system including
the universities. This was not the place to receive
vocational counsehng in the traditional sense. One
of the Panthers handed him some political pamph-
lets with pictures of Black kids carrying guns.

I accompanied the Joker and Oscar down the
hill on the bus. They were both hurt by the treat-
ment they had received at the embassy. Joker talked
about ahimsa, bhakti, love, nonviolence; Oscar
said that the Panthers were not African Blacks.

When we reached the center of town, I ex-
plained that I was going to walk around to visit
banks. If they wished to join me they were wel-
come. I told Oscar that if my money arrived, I
would give him twenty-five dollars. It was raining
and cold. Oscar said he had nothing better to do.

We spent four hours tramping from one bank
to another. Joker and Oscar would wait outside
for me. Oscar watched me curiously. After the
sixth futile bank interview, I said we would call
it off for the day. I shrugged an apology to Oscar.

- Let's go to a cafe.

Joker paid for the coffee and a .pack of cig-
arettes.

258 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

- Are you free and happy here, asked the Joker.

- No.

- Can I help you?

- Pray for us. We'll meet in India. Back home.

- I am free, said the Joker. As long as I am free
there is hope.

The next day I met Joker and Oscar at a side-
walk cafe on the Avenue. Oscar kept looking at
me expectantly. I said that I had no money, but
that I would make some money for him. I bor-
rowed a dime from Joker and bought a student's
notebook at a stationery store. On the first page I
wrote, "Book for Oscar, by Timothy Leary, Algiers,
January 1971."

In fifteen minutes I filled the book with diagrams
and slogans about the seven visible revolutions
and the seven internal liberations.

On the last page I wrote that this book was cur-
rency, a medium of exchange, and would be re-
deemed by me or by any friend of mine for twenty-
five dollars.

- When you arrive in Europe look for a young
American with long hair. Tell him you have this
book which you will exchange for twenty-five dol-
lars. Oscar looked at me skeptically but took the
book.

Cynthia and Milt continued to spend much of
their time with the Panthers. Milt told me there
that he had straightened everything out. Cleaver
was eager to have us join their family to spend

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 259

our days working at the embassy and our nights
in friendly discourse. This sounded good, but facts
were that we were under house arrest, continually
surveyed, with no passports. Milt laughed and
said that ain't good. He was having a good time
as pur,, adviser and diplomatic agent. He believed
that we had been selected, like Jesus, you might
say, to be central figures in a great historical
drama, to be the symbols of white reconciliation.
We should be humble, pay dues, see things in the
cosmic dimension. It was a great honor.

^fejold him that we were uninterested in per-
petuating any sort of martyr mythjjvewere Hindus
anyway, and if the honor was so great we weren't
selfish about it so why didn't he and Cynthia send
their passports back to Sam and join ug as the first
interracial couple in the new Utopia. Everyone
knew that no man in the Panther community was
there voluntarily. The new society was based on
fugitive helplessness. We^ still wanted to hve with
the Panthers as comrades, w^ shared the yearning,
but we were not going to be drafted into a military
organization led by a man whose ambitions we did
not share.

On the bus returning home from the embassy
I found myself hanging from a strap next to a
Falstaffian apparition. A middle-aged man, red-
faced, round, twinkhng. He wore a brilHant robe;
his hair was dyed orange and he smiled radiantly.

- Dr. Leary, I presume.

260 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

He claimed to be attached to the U.S. embassy
in some obscure way. He was the perfect cine-
matic caricature of a CIA agent. He loved Algeria
and the people and his glorious apartment was
large and there were always a few homeless young
men to share his hospitahty. He exuded cheerful
conjfidence. He invited ug^to drop around for drinks.
I shuddered at the frivolity of the possibility.

He kept glancing at me with amusement. We
were both swaying silently Uke trapeze performers
as the bus whirled down the curving streets to the
port. He turned to me with a wicked smile.

- You should know that the American colony
here in Algiers is very grateful to you and your
wife. It's such a dull place and you have provided
us with much entertainment.

He smiled. We continued to sway together in
silence. With another dramatic turn toward me,
he continued.

- The Paris Herald Tribune carried a front-
page story last week in which Mr. Cleaver claimed
responsibility and authority over all Americans in
Algeria. My dear, you can imagine the flutter this
created in the colony here. He smiled tenderly.
Actually the story was so good it went out on the
international wire and several people in the Amer-
ican embassy received phone calls from concerned
relatives about our being under the control of the
bad Panthers. Your activities keep our cocktail
parties in conversation, you know. So many people
would Uke to meet you and your charming wife.

I nodded grimly. If I were seen talking this way
to an American embassy person? Whew! As the
bus swayed our bodies bumped together. He was a

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 261

magnificent actor. Each line was rehearsed and
delivered with a flourish.

- It's all bravura comic opera, you know. I sup-
pose that any pubhcity is better than none.

I was trying to smile bravely. After a long
silence he turned on me again.

- I do hope that you and your wife are enjoying
the humor of it all as much as we are.

18

The letter from our Madrid protectors, Mario
and Christina, came at the right time. Help was
on the way. ^^wrote back telling them to come.
They arrived at the airport with that cheerful free
radiation that prisoners envy. E.G. had approved
of their coming. He was sensitive to certain rumors
going around that we were being held in house
arrest.

Mario wanted to meet E.G. so it was arranged
that we would visit the embassy Sunday for the
Commander's prerecorded rap on Marxist theory.
When we arrived we discovered that the seminar
had been canceled so we sat in the conference
room surrounded by liberated video equipment
and large wall maps of the world. Eldridge asked
questions about LSD and brain damage. After-
ward we drove to the beach and watched the fish-
ing boats returning in the sunset and picked out
fish which the Uttle port restaurant chef prepared.

Mario was outraged by ^ur^captivity. He could
not understand our passive compUance. We tried
to explain about the unique racial scene in Amer-
ica, about Black rage and white guilt, paying dues,
and the special tenderness of heart that Jean
Genet said was necessary in dealing with the Pan-
thers. But Mario had a European resistance point

264 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

of view and was eager to play a rerun of his youth-
ful antifascist heroics. He sat in the study pre-
paring escape plans. We knew that sooner or later
someone would dig the romance and buzz pos-
sibilities of our captivity-release. We. had sent one
message to Mick Jagger to send a boat but the
word never reached England. A lot of people knew
of ffur^plight and we wondered who would show up
to save us. We^also knew that many of our friends
were getting bored with rescuing us.

We drove Mario and Christina to Bou Saada.
He took over the hotel scene with an aristocratic
sweep, in contrast to our proletarian humility.
The second day we visited the oasis and sat for
eight hours in sand dunes watching wind and sun.
It was a crucial day in the lives of our visitors. In
the late afternoon I noticed a flock of sheep mov-
ing down from the heights above us. I rose to
investigate. As I walked up the slope an old
shepherd with a dog emerged from behind the
flock. He was dressed in some timeless bedouin
garb. I stood fifty feet below him dressed in silken
shirt, velvet trousers, silver Navaho belt, sandals,
and a camera slung around my neck. I waved and
spoke in French and he replied in laconic Arabic.
I smiled, bowed, and waved arms in appreciation
and descended to the dune cup where my friends
were staring at the sun. The flock continued mov-
ing down toward us, herding us out of the desert
as nightfall approached.

Back in the apartment Mario continued to or-
ganize the details of the escape, complete with
elaborate codes, meeting places, intermediaries,
and Swiss banldng connections. The secrecy was

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 265

as much for his protection as for ours since it was
extremely risky for him to be identified with
Algerian revolutionaries and dope fiends. He was
happy about the scam and beamed protective love
for us.

After the departure of Mario and Christinaj^a,
began seeing a lot of Eldridge. He started hanging
out at the apartment. The script still called for jus^
to have no money so,we benefited from his largesse
of cigarettes, sweet rolls, and grass. Ariana would
spend the morning shopping and preparing suc-
culent roasts and gourmet sauces. E.G. was hip
and funny and wise. He'd ask why we didn't spend
more time at the embassy, then laugh and say that
he understood why we would want to stay away
from the police station. We would smoke and
discuss the world situation. Now and thenpve^
would dig some Black perspectives in the daily
news that he had not noticed. He often remarked
that he liked us^better after the bust than before.
He was lonely in Algeria. There weren't many
people he could relax, rap, and smoke with. He
wanted to be friends and ^ve wanted the same.
Half the time he was the most tender, wise, loving
man in the world. In the flush of tender moments
he would ask for closeness and we would look at
the beautiful prison guard and shrug our shoul-
ders. * *

- You have kept us away from Kathleen and
the community by creating this racial enclave on
the other side of town.

He would frown and look away. Once he asked
us if we thought he was a pig. She said softly that
there was no other way to look at it. He reflected

266 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

for a moment and said, ~ Yes, I am a pig. You
have to have pigs. We've got to be ready to deal
vnth discipline and security in the future.

- So you are practicing on us, is that it? she
asked. "

I remember the first time I met Cleaver, at a
love-in near Palo Alto. I gave a short talk about
the danger facing Eldridge and asked for prayers
to guard him. Eldridge made a long speech in
which he spoke about the Man whose finger would
be on the button which fired the bomb. He said
that he wanted his finger on the button. He wanted
to be the Man, that's all.

We met Jolly Hamid in the street intersection,
the first time since the night we didn't show up for
our own dinner party. We felt exposed talking in
the avenue and made a date to meet in his office.
It seemed dangerous walking through surveyed
streets. I handed Hamid the Newsweek account
of the kidnapping. He asked what we wanted. I
said that we wanted residence papers, which
Eldridge had never obtained for us; that we
wanted to live freely. He said that he had friends
in high places and would make inquiries and
sense out of the political web.

Brian and Liz and little Davie came by the flat.
Their situation was in such a free contrast to
ours. They had no money, no home, no connec-
tions and floated through life comfortably and
genially. Their sweep and charm allowed them
to move through Algeria as honored guests, stay-
ing with families in the Casbah, merging into the
native Hfe, dining cheaply in little restaurants

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 267

incorporated in the benevolent folds of Arab hospi-
tality. They were about to hitchhike a thousand
miles down the desert to Tinduf because Brian
liked the sound of the name and thought that
something magical would happen to them there.
Having them at the apartment was against the
rules but there was something about them that
made us^feel safe and happy in spite of their
disgraceful unmilitary garb.

We met Olga on the street and sat with her in
a cafe. She dehcately indicated that powerful
figures in the government were our^ friends and
offered to arrange a dinner to meet some officials.
We set the date for Saturday night,
'^ur poverty was another crippling factor. After
theBfdnap I had worked frantically to finish
the third version of this manuscript. Mario had
smuggled it to Madrid and mailed it to New York.
We were expecting the $7,500 advance due upon
delivery of the book. This third version was a
rambling, flamboyant, insane epic poem which
Brian Barritt read in one sitting and pronounced
a Joycean masterpiece. The language was eccen-
tric: puns, word plays, neologisms. The words
were not significative but sprayed out as energy-
emitting bleeps.

The editor cabled enthusiastically that we'd
receive a decision on the manuscript in five days.
After a week I started going to the post office
every evening to put through a collect call. It
took two or three hours to make the connection.
For eight days the editor was out of the office, in
conference, out to lunch, would call back.,We had
based our hopes of freedom on the advance and

268 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

jm. would lie awake nights sweating out the pos-
sibility that we were stranded in Algiers without
any way of making a living.

Saturday afternoon the embassy called and
said that Eldridge would be by the flat to see us
at eight o'clock. I nervously asked if we couldn't
see him earher because we were going out to din-
ner. This was impossible. ^^ decided that wf..
would drive to Olga's at seven, that I would
stay for drinks and return to the flat to see E.G.
and then return to the dinner.

Olga joked about the fact that it was exactly
four weeks since the first dinner party. ^Sig didn't
totally appreciate the humor knowing that I'd
be explaining to Eldridge that we were dining
with the very guests whose presence at our flat
prompted the bust. Bella knew about our date
and approved but still . . ,

At quarter to eight I rose and explained that I
had a date with Eldridge. A hush descended as I
kissed Her and walked out.

In the lobby of the apartment I met one of the
young guards. He was upset that She was not
with me; Eldridge wanted us both at the embassy.
I went back up to the apartment for Her. ^e got
in Ms car and drove back along the sea on the
same route, in the same car, with the same driver
breaking up another Saturday night dinner four
weeks later.

It was a long scary ride to the embassy holding
hands. The driver reassured jLja that there was
nothing to worry about. He was right. It seemed
that a Life reporter-photographer team was in
town to do a story about the Iddnapping. Cleaver

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 269

had refused to see them or give them ouy address.
He had spent the afternoon hidden out in a *secret
Panther pad which the Life reporter tracked down.
It freaked E.G. when he opened the door and
found two journalists confronting him. He had
been persuaded that his refusal to produce us
would suggest that ^we were still being held
prisoners and give the most sensational and dam-
aging twist to the story. E.G. was both enraged
and suppliant as he asked us Jo have dinner with
the journalists.

- These Saturday night dinner parties are get-
ting to be a drag, she said.

Monday morning we^ borrowed coins from
Ariana and took the bus to the embassy in response
to a summons. Eldridge told ug^that it was now
time for us to be integrated into the military-
communal hfe. He were to report each morning
to the office and spend the day working for the
party. A Panther car would come by our apartment
to pick us up. I was to start off by doing manual
work in the basement; ghe^ould help out in the
Panther nursery school or do clerical work in the
embassy. She nodded and went into the reception
office to talk to Kathleen. E.G. said that I might
be assigned to write a script for a videotape
attacking the Berrigans who were saying such re-
visionist things as: "A revolution is interesting
insofar as it avoids hke the plague the plague it
promises to heal." The Berrigans were emerging as
spokesmen for the American Revolution and must
be exposed. Off the Berrigans might be th^ title
of the flick.

270 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

She returned cheerily and told E.G. that she
had worked out a schedule with Kathleen for
helping out with the kids. Eldridge replied coldly
that Kathleen was the receptionist and had nothing
to say about work assignments. We would both
report to the embassy each morning and be told
what to do.

Back in the apartment we agreed that it was
about time for us to make our move. ^Shie would
feign illness and stay home for the next few days
while I would start the escape procedures.

Tuesday morning I waited until 10:30 for the
car pool. I phoned the embassy and was told that
they forgot to pick us up. I should proceed by bus.
I brought the transcriptions of the interviews with
Bella. E.G. seemed pleased when I suggested
that my first task should be to edit them for
publication. There was still the hope that the
interviews would bring fame and fortune to us all.

I ate lunch in the communal kitchen and was
touched to see the Gommander washing dishes.
He grinned when I looked at him. In spite of all
past cruelties I dug him, and his wily cynical
sense of paradox. We were both survivors against
the odds.

I was sitting in an easy chair next to the recep-
tion room working on the manuscript. Eldridge
was expecting a telephone connection to San
Francisco for a conversation with Huey Newton
which was to be carried live on radio-TV. Every-
one gathered around to hsten. It was an awesome
confrontation between two angry men.

Eldridge hung up and said that Huey had ex-
pelled us from the Black Panther party and was

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 271

going to write the Algerian, Chinese, and North
Korean Governments to withdraw support. Cleaver
seemed pleased.

There was a lot to talk about when I returned
to the apartment.

I spent the next day in the easy chair in the
conference room watching videotapes being filmed
to be sent to America explaining Cleaver's side
of the quarrel between the two top Panthers.
Huey's faction controlled the party newspaper.
Eldridge was escalating the media war with Mc-
Luhan weaponry. The video programs were called
Voodoo Tapes. Three young French radicals were
making the film. In the first, Kathleen explained
why Huey was a revisionist seeking accommoda-
tion with the capitalist enemy and betraying the
principles of violent revolution. Eldridge sat next
to her looking stern. When she finished her pol-
ished recitation she gave a militant fist. The cam-
era panned to Cleaver who said in a quiet voice,
- Death to All Revisionists.

Eldridge made a tape defining Huey as the right
wing of the Panther party. Eldridge identified the
Algeria Panthers as Maoist and Newton's faction
as relating to Russian revisionism.

Eldridge and the Commander were discussing
the Newton situation in front of me. The Com-
mander laughed and put his arm around my
shoulders.

- At least we have a captive audience of one,
he said.

- Don't forget that Fm an escape artist I said.
This delighted the Commander.

Back in the flat I described the strange and

272 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

exciting doings of the folks in the big houses on
the hill. Ariana was no longer working at the em-
bassy. She was unhappy and cried a lot.

Leaving for the office on Thursday morning I
was handed some books which Ariana was return-
ing to Eldridge. Sitting on the bus I read Bakunin*s
essay on anarchism, a ruthless directive for all-out
violent revolution, spelling out how the revolu-
tionist classifies and uses every person, every situ-
ation, with cold destructive exploitation. The
revolutionist is frankly warned that he or she is
also to be used as an instrument and discarded.
The document was consistent in its scientific, icy,
disciplined logic. I thought of Ariana weeping at
our house, still loyal to the process that promised
to crush her.

She had been cleaning her nails that morning
with the switchblade that Eldridge had given her.
We^ asked if she wanted to kill. She told several
horror stories of her mother's rape and beatings
by French soldiers. Yes, she would enjoy killing.

The videotaping continued at the embassy. It
was a front-row seat at the great heavyweight
match — a tragic, sorrowful spectacle. Our politi-
cal allegiance was to Huey who was attempting,
however inefficiently, to build an organization and
to win power for the people. Our ^emotional al-
legiance was to Eldridge. But overriding such
preferences was sadness at seeing the bravest,
strongest men in Afro-American history attacking
each other instead of the mutual enemy. Some
New York Panthers had jumped bail during the
Trial of the Twenty-one and fled to Algiers. They
sat in front of the camera detailing the misdeeds

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 273

of Huey Newton, who himself was sitting in a
penthouse overlooking Oakland, surrounded by
bodyguards and hurling threats across the sea
at Eldridge who was sitting in his villa in El Biar.

Friday morning Eldridge talked to me standing
in the sunshine of the embassy balcony. He
showed me a letter he had written to our friend
Jakov Kohn, then editor of the East Village Other,
an underground paper in New York. Eldridge
denounced the noble, wise Jakov for his support
of us. The last hne was ominous. Don't worry.
Papa will take care of them.

That did it. I told Eldridge that jve needed gur^
passports in case the advance money arrived at
the bank. He was pleased that bread was coming.
He wanted to know why we needed both passports.
I said that ^^ had a joint account and that we
might split for India over the weekend. He waslrP
an expansive mood and gave me the passports.

At home, JSh£ and I locked ourselves in the
bedroom and started packing. The jangle of the
doorbeU startled us^ It was Jolly Hamid who had
come by to ask us out for dinner, ^lie, stayed.

We went to the only hip-young cafe in Algiers.
It was a prevision of a happy future for socialism.
It was the only happy public place in the country.
The only place where Algerian women could laugh
and flirt. The only place where young music could
be heard, where the clients were proud revolution-
ary Algerians who wanted to make it a happy
pure country. The cafe was a seed of one possible
flowering. Bella had warned me that it was the
most wicked place in Algeria.

During dinner Hamid said that he had received

274 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

favorable reports from his friends in the govern-
ment about our status. He shyly asked what would
happen to our apartment if we moved to the
country. The housing shortage crippled courting
activities. Algerian young men lived at home with
their families where the seclusion of women made
it impossible to entertain guests. The height of
luxury and erotic achievement was to score an
apartment. I said that if it could be arranged we
would like to have him take over our apartment.

We planned to return to our flat after dinner.
En route Hamid drove to the house of his friend,
an Algerian television announcer. He rolled down
the car window and called softly up to the win-
dows. Muktar. Ah yeh. Muktar. It was a tender
moment. Perhaps Muktar is at the studio. We
drove to the modern television building. Hamid
reappeared smiling with Muktar and another tele-
vision announcer. It was a moment of honor and
initiatory sharing for him to bring his two friends
to our house.

When we walked in the apartment I saw that
the door to the living room was closed. She ran
from the bedroom with an alarmed look. Eldridge
is here ,ghe whispered. We tiptoed through the
hallway to our study. The Algerians had brought
piles of patisserie dripping with sugar and choc-
olate.

They too felt the presence of Eldridge six feet
away in the next room. She made tea and we were
listening to rock music when the door opened.
Eldridge Cleaver stood towering above us tall as a
giant, his shirt undone, his muscled arms gleam-
ing.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 275

He swept the room with contempt and motioned
me out. We stood in the hallway.

- Is something bothering you I asked.

- Who are those cats he hissed.
He was angry.

I said they were prominent Algerians and
friends.

- Get their names. We'll deal with this in the
morning.

As he stalked back into the living room, it
occurred to me that he was too enraged to re-
member to ask for the passports.

The Uttle group sat timidly in the study.

Hamid asked if it was all right to smoke hash-
ish. I said no.

We heard Eldridge leave. Soon after the door
opened Ariana walked in the room. She was wear-
ing a mini nightgown which manifested the beauty
of her body and the silky sheen of her dimpled
legs. She examined the room and said something
about looking for a book. She was checking for
hashish smoke.

The Algerian guests talked quietly about Cleav-
er's behavior. They were offended. They said that
a guest in their country should not behave rudely
to his hosts. We sensed something strong and
ancient in their sohdarity and that they included
us within their circle.

They shook our hands warmly and looked deeply
into our eyes astHey left.

19

Dawn brought the cries of roosters and a gentle
knock on^oyj bedroom window. Khali was standing
on the balcony with another man. We passed the
suitcases out the window and they were lifted
over the wall to the neighboring balcony. Khali
returned and told us to leave the apartment at nine
o'clock and take a^axi to the Beach Hotel where
we would be expected. He told us, that the apart-
ment would be watched and there was nothing
to fear. At 9 : 00 a.m. we kissed each other and She
left. I stayed behind to send a final line to Eldridge.
I knocked at the door of the living room. Ariana
was dressed ready to go out. I said She had gone
to get breakfast. After she left I phoneS Eldridge.
His voice was gruff.

- We are going to spht the city for a few days
at the Beach Hotel.

His response was a roar.

- Nol

- We have to have a few days of rest. You can
dig th'aT

- You are going to stay right there.

- We are going.

He paused for an instant.

- I want you to come up here right now.

278 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

- m be right up I said. I had lost all fear of
terror.

- And bring the passports.

- Ill come to talk but I won't bring the pass-
ports.

I heard him calling to the Commander and a
brief side discussion.

- You come here now and bring those pass-
ports!

- No passports. It's a new chapter now. Wfi'\1_
be at the Beach Hotel if you want tq contact us.

There was a silence in which I could feel his
anger, and then the phone clicked off.

I walked down to the avenue and took a cab to
the beach. The hotel glowed with the feeling of
home. The young clerks and the chambermaids
gathered arounji smiling and patting my arms.
They were pointing up the stairs. Dix-neuf comme
toujours they were saying. I took the stairs three
at a time. .She had already arranged the room
with our rugs and furs and cushions.

It was another one of those high home again
scenes. Shg wrapped her arms around us.

Later the maids came with tea and performed
welcome rituals, murmuring incantations. When
we entered the restaurant that night the staff sur-
rounded us with love. ^7e were ushered to a table
looking out the large windows to the village
square. During the next joyous hours everyone
in the village passed by to wave. Khali just hap-
pened to drop by the bar with the pohce chief and
the mayor. They stood around quj table smiling.
We^ felt the same new-birth rush of free joy that
we had experienced with the Weathermen. Every

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 279

one of the men and many of the women had
themselves been underground guerrillas in the
recent past. They knew what independence day
meant.

That evening i^ called 01 ga and Jolly Hamid.
Both mentioned that they had friends in the
government who were eager to talk with us^ and
find out what they could do to help jjs start a new
life as Algerian residents. I called Bella and told
her about our conversation. We arranged that we
would meet on Wednesday night as usual for the
interviews with Ahmed.

The next days were dreamy and real. We walked
along the sea, saw the fishing boats come in, and
sat on the huge rocks of the breakwater and
watched the sun set. Then we would sink into the
sweet privacy of room 19. "^

Wednesday, the fourth day of liberation, I
phoned the embassy and asked for Bella. We con-
firmed our rendezvous. I could hear a Panther
voice in the background saying that's Leary on
the phone. Bella said that Eldxidge wanted to know
where the key to the bedroom was.

- Tell him that we still have things stored
there. Til get them in the next few days and leave
the key.

Bella said that Eldridge wanted to talk to me.

- Hey, man, just what do you think you are
doing? You're not supposed to act this way. You
have got to come back and live under party super-
vision.

- It doesn't feel good I said.

- If you don't come back we gonna move on
you.

280 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

- Yeah bo. Fse scared.

Eldridge waited a moment, caught it, and
laughed.

- Fm serious, man. We gonna move on you.

- We're not outnumbered anymore.

- I mean this time we gonna move on you
with the government. They know you're living out
of that hippie commune at Moretti.

- The Algerian Government knows exactly
what we're doing.

- And so do we. You're being watched you know.
I'm going to warn you one more time and then
we'll move.

That evening at Bella's apartment we did no
work on the interview. We had dinner early. While
Bella cooked, Ahmed talked seriously. He said
that he was our friend and that we were on the
verge of disaster. The conversation was in melo-
dramatic French. He spoke about Arab prudish-
ness and the hard Hne against drugs. He spoke
about the Algerian prisons which were not like the
American ones. Bella added that there was no
feeling of Western chivalry and they did some
pretty unbelievable things to women. I remembered
E.C.'s interest in brainwashing techniques. I
thanked them for the advice and left after dinner.

Saturday night we had dinner at Olga's to talk
to sleek Muktar, the Algerian official whom we
missed the night of the Life magazine affair.

He said that he had been assigned by the govern-
ment to act as liaison. He knew I would under-
stand the necessity for doing business this way.
He repeated the message that the government was

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 281

insulted by Cleaver's actions with us. He didn't
like Eldridge.

I said thatwewanted residence cards, and would
like to find a house.

We discussed the possibility that I might teach
at the university. The government was severing
its dependence on French teachers and wanted to
recruit American professors. We discussed the
courses I might teach. He and his French vnfe were
charming, and we left looking foreward to this
academic future. - I always wanted to be a pro-
fessor's wife §he said.

Next day the hotel manager Khali joined us for
dinner. He smiled and asked if ^ were meeting
more Algerians. Many people wanted to talk to ug.
He said that everyone I would meet in Algiers
worked for at least one government. That as far
as we were concerned there were three factions
interested in us. The left-wing militant revolution-
ists would be unsympathetic, but would surely try
to contact us^ involve us in promises of help to
find out what we knew. The right-wing forces were
CIA, low-profile9 but everjrwhere. They would want
information about the Panthers. The country was
run by the army through the president's office.
What happened to us in Algeria would depend now
upon what was deciSed by this faction which had
all the power.

Brian Barritt and Liz and Davie showed up at
the hotel. We were now free to be happy to see
them. They had taken trips with the Tuaregs and
wandered around in the desert on rainbow camels
and had a thousand and one miraculous tales to
tell. They had found the house at Moretti, a fash-

282 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

ionable beach across the bay and were being pro-
tected by the owner a young French teacher whose
life was about to be changed radically.

Brian and I had long discussions about the
craft of writing. The alchemy of words. For Brian
the word was the atom, the sentence the molecule,
the paragraph the substance. He wrote only in
paragraphs which he kept on small papers which
could be shuffled and dealt out like Tarot cards.
We agreed that in the neurological-electronic fu-
ture plagiarism would be recognized as the basic
principle of live writing. Ifs Mother Nature's lit-
erary lesson. The DNA code is a chromosome
script passed on,through generations with no copy-
rights to the individual. Creativity is deliberate or
unconscious distortion in transmission. Rights of
reproduction cannot be reserved^ Mutations are
imprinting errors. Each new edition bears the
flaws of the reissuer. Originality, evolutionary sui-

cide^a monstrous conceit. . ^^_

'^(11 ll^W book would be totally plagia-
rized. Each word, each sentence, each paragraph

would be exactly transmitted unchanged^ /

le next time ilrian snowed Up leaping witn
merry joy, we were sitting in the back of the res-
taurant smoking with Khali. He had something to
show me ; a book in Arabic. It described the history
of slave trading along the North African coast.
It was customary for Barbary pirates to overpower
trading ships, and capture Christians for the slave
markets in Tangier, Algiers, Tunis. White slaves
were classified according to nationality and pro-
fession. Ransom lists were carefully tailored to
what the traffic would bear. Each category of

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 283

white slave had a ransom price. Spanish and
Italian seamen were valueless and sold to the
labor market. An English sailor could be ransomed
for five hundred dollars. The highest price tags
were pinned on American captives. It was some
sort of national honor thing that Americans would
pay any price. The ransom price for an American
sailor was five thousand dollars. The value of an
American captain or a doctor was ten thousand
dollars. It seems to me Tve heard that figure men-
tioned recently, Bhq^ said.

The problem of American slaves in North Africa
was so great that Benjamin Franklin arranged a
national lottery to raise ^money for ransom.

Monday morning we received a significant bleep
from the important Algerian diplomat who had
visited jis in America. He said that he had wanted
to see us for some time, to welcome us to his
countryBut that his duties had kept him abroad.
Could we come to his home for dinner? If there
was anything he could do to make ouj^ stay in
Algeria happy he was at our service. We floated
on that message for a few hours.

Letters came from Mario in breathless code. He
was working on plans to get u^ out of Algeria,
perhaps to Switzerland.

Tuesday morning a phone call from a man
speaking French who said he was from the presi-
dent's office. I asked, president of what. He
laughed. The President of Algeria. He asked if it
would be convenient for us to meet with some
government officials this morning. We should wait
at the hotel and a car would be sent for us^^

We sat in the village restaurant and watched

^r^y^

284 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

three confident young men leap out of a black car.
They were dressed in sport shirts and sweaters.
They sat with us as we finished breakfast. They
were beaming amusement, and reassurance.
- Mangez professeur, they kept saying. They
wanted me to accompany them to the government
headquarters, jhe was to remain. We looked at
each other with that here-we-go-again look, kissed
and I split in the black car.

Six officials were sitting in a conference room.
The assistant minister came, in shook my hand
with a smile and sat behind the large desk. The
first thing he did was hand me two green cards.
Her picture was on one. gh^ looked hke a seven-
teen-year-old Itahan movie star. My McMillan
shaved head was stapled to the other.

It is a pleasure for the Algerian Government to
have you join us. We want you to know that you
are a free person here. This is a free country. You
and your wife are our guests here. We wish to
apologize for any inconveniences or misunder-
standings that have occurred. When we gave you
political asylum we took you under the protection of
our government. You are safe and free to live your
life here as you wish. The world is observing your
presence here. Algeria is not Texas. Everyone
present dug that line.

I was asked what the Algerian Government could
do for us. Another official, one whom I knew to be
liaison with the Panthers and a friend of Bella's,
was asked to arrange for a house, a job, and travel
visas.

Another official wanted to ask questions about
the Panthers' treatment of us. Had they abuseci^^us

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 285

physically, used force, did they carry guns. I said
that no force had been used, that the only Panthers
who carried guns were Eldridge and the Com-
mander and that they were authorized to do so. I
looked at Bella's friend and said that j^ had been
warned by friends of the Panthers about the rough
treatment prisoners could receive in Algerian pris-
ons but that I did not believe such threats to
be true. It was a direct message to Bella. I was
still grumpy about that last evening of coercion
with her. I said that ^ believed in the cause of
the Black Panthers and that we did not wish to
harm their struggle, that we held no grudges, after
all, our four days in prison were nothing compared
to four hundred years of Afro-American slavery.
Everybody dug that. It was one of my few good
lines.

The minister asked me if we wanted to see the
Panthers. Before I could answer he continued that
he did not think it a good idea at the moment.
There was a nice moment of more handshaking
and good wishes. As I turned to leave the minister
said, - Bon, now phone Monsieur Cleaver and
ask him to come down this afternoon.

The government limousine drove me back to
the beach. Just before we hit the coast the high-
way was lined with policemen. Then police
cruisers, turret lights flashing, and motorcycle
cops waving all traffic to the side.

The President is coming, the driver told me. We
sat for ten minutes, the tension mounting until
the approaching buzz turned into a blast of power.
The black presidential limousine zapped along the
narrow road at eighty miles an hour surrounded

286 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

by an oval cluster of helmet-goggled leather-
jacketed guards on black death-defying motor-
cycles. A raw, Insolent display of kingly might.
And regal insecurity. Assassins had roadblocked
the presidential car in a previous abortive coup.

The driver pulled up to the hotel and SbfL^an
out. I showed her the green security cards. yVe
had another escape-victory celebration scene in
each other's arms. A cluster of villagers and hotel
staff buzzed around joyously and ^ could feel
the news spreading in concentric ripples through
the village.

Later I called Olga and thanked her. She was a
loving friend and happy for us. Then I called
Mukdar and thanked him. He se'emed surprised. It
happened faster than he expected. That makes it
all the more impressive and increases our grati-
tude. He then shifted to an executive gear and
asked if we would come by his apartment that
evening for a drink. - Now that you have your
papers there are many things that we must discuss
about your future.

Sleek Mukdar lived in a swank Second Empire
duplex overlooking the center of town. He mixed
drinks suavely. He loved America. He hoped to go
to the United States. He told us^ that the Algerian
government had asked him to be liaison with us.
We would understand that our relationships with
the government could be handled most smoothly
in the context of a friendship rather than speak-
ing to a strange bureaucrat over a desk. It was the
Algerian way of doing things. He invited ii§^ to
dinner that weekend and said that we would start
taking weekend drives with his wife and son to

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 287

look for villas along the coast. He was already
investigating a villa on the west coast which he
described in mouth-watering real-estate poetry.

When we^ asked him what exactly was his job
with the government, he became vague. He said
that he had played an important part in the
Revolution and that the chiefs of the army all
knew him and owed him favors. He motioned to
the luxurious apartment. He said that after inde-
pendence he worked as an editor of a government
paper. One day, Ben Bella was angered by an
article and ordered him to report to the presi-
dential palace at once. He knew this was a death
summons, so he drove at once to the Moroccan
border and stayed out of the country until the
coup toppled Ben Bella. It didn't hurt him with the
present regime he said.

I showed him an invitation we had received to
attend a conference in Denmark and asked if he
could arrange exit visas for us. The conference
was to be held on May 7, a month in the future.
No problem he said.

We were now free for the first time to tour
around Algeria and get to know the country of our
adoption. We^ drove to the hot baths of Hamman
Salahin and immersed ourselves to the neck in the
hot sulfur springs, which did seem to sooth our
nerves, restore om, bodies, and enable u§ to ex-
perience what Aleister Crowley would call the
Aethyr. We drove to El Oued, fabled city of a
thousand domes, sitting in the sand. Coming
through the desert at night wg missed the detour
sign and got lost. Nomads surrounded, the car. We
had seen their campfires burning and heard the

[

288 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

barking of dogs. They offered tea and quad and
guided us gently and without words back to the
highwayTWe^ visited Biskra and sat in the ancient
baths, deciding not to spend the night in a rented
stone chamber because of the illness vibes which
overrode the healing waters. We^ touched base at
Bou Saada. We, did not realize until Brian Barritt
told us months later that we were following exactly
the route which Aleister Crowley took on his search
for desert illumination. The eerie synchronicities
between^our Uves and that of Crowley, which were
later to preoccupy us, were still unfolding with
such precision as to make y^ wonder if one can
escape the programmed imprinting with which we
are born. At times it seemed so oedipally pre-
packaged.

Wq spent more time with Brian and Liz and
Davie, walking on the beach, lounging in the
sun around their villa, tuning into Brian's magic
and alchemy. He often spoke about the similari-
ties between our meetings and the collaboration
of Dr. Dee, the Elizabethan magician-professor,
and his medium-receiver Edward Kelly. We made
elaborate plans for scientific experiments in which
B.B. would act as a receiver and I as transmitter.
Aleister Crowley claimed to belong to the same
line of magical manifestation.

20

Wg^saw quite a bit of sleek Mukdar after we
returned from the desert pilgrimage. Family
picnics on the beach. One afternoon he called
excitedly to say that a rendevous had been ar-
ranged with a high official. He came to get me at
the hotel. He was wired up, his tension communi-
cating the importance that the meeting was to
have for him and presumably for us. He drive
hastily to Algiers. He explained that the contact
was so powerful that we could not meet in an
office. The official would meet us on a street
corner. We drove slowly down a side street near
the port, a small, furtive man in hooded robe
darted out of a doorway and entered the back
seat. His name was Muhammad. We shook hands.
He smiled showing bad teeth. He seemed nervous.

We drove several miles beyond the city limits
to a small farm town. En route Muhammad spoke
rapidly in French. The government was happy to
have me in Algeria. They hoped I would teach
in the university. I said that it was a good idea.
He asked me if I would teach at the University
of Oran, a new educational complex in western
Algeria. They would find a house for us. They
hoped I would not talk about drugs. •

Mukdar parked the car behind a garage and

290 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

we walked to a cafe and selected a seat outside
away from the car. It was clear that Muhammad
did not want to be seen with me. Both Algerians
glanced around uneasily.

Muhammad said critical things about the
Panthers. He attacked the young university stu-
dents who were protesting and seemed pleased
that the police had crushed the recent demonstra-
tions. He attacked my friend Jolly Hamid, calling
him a hippie. He said that Hamid had Hved in
Greenwich Village in New York when he was
assigned to the UN. He said Greenwich Village
as though it were a bad word. He wanted to know
who killed the Kennedys.

On the way back to the city he asked questions
about the Panthers. I told him that I knew nothing
more than was published in the paper. He wanted
to know if Cleaver received money from the
Chinese Government. He seemed disappointed in
my replies. I asked about exit visas so that we
could attend the conference in Denmark. Muham-
mad told Mukdar to give him our passports the
following day.

After we dropped Muhammad off in the center
of town I asked Mukdar who he was and why he
appeared so furtive. Mukdar explained that power
in Algeria did not always reside with the public
figures. That the real rulers of the country avoided
publicity. There was no doubt that Mukdar re-
spected and feared Muhammad. I asked Mukdar if
I should not contact the President's office about
our plans. He impatiently said that we should
not confuse the lines of communication.

Back in the hotel I gave Mukdar our passports.

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 291

He said he'd call me when the visas were ready.
We^spent the next three days packing for our trip.
Wg^ expected to return to Algeria but we weren't
sure. I hoped to contact publishers in Denmark,
perhaps visit Sweden, and with Mario's help per-
haps find a new land of refuge. The day before
we were to leave Mukdar returned our passports.
There were no exit visas. He smiled confidently
and told us to report to the airport two hours
before the flight. That vz^ would be expected. With
Muhammad's protection you need no papers in
Algeria.

Jolly Hamid called and asked if he could take
us to the airport. He had a Ust of rock records he
hoped we could obtain in Copenhagen. The man-
ager of the hotel stored ouj rugs and furniture in
the hotel basement and treated us to a farewell
brunch. * *

When we arrived at the airport the first glance
revealed two Panthers standing by the exit gate.
We stood in the check-in hne. The flight called for
us to change planes with an hour layover in
Zurich. We did not want to enter Switzerland, an
Interpol country. \^ checked the bags through to
Copenhagen where Mario and Christina were to
meet us.

Half hour before departure \^ walked to the
exit gate. The Panthers had disappeared. The offi-
cial checked qjir passports and asked about exit
visas. We explained that they were not necessary;
that the chief of the airport knew about our de-
parture. We were told to sit in chairs near the
immigration office. Officials huddled, together in
the office. They made phone calls. Ten minutes

292 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

before departure the chief of the airport came over
to ask who had authorized our exit. I said Mu-
hammad. He looked puzzled and returned to make
more phone calls. "^S^o-jwere watching the clock
move closer to zero. Two minutes to go. The air-
port chief called to an assistant to delay the flight.
Five minutes after departure time the chief told
jus^that we would not be allowed to leave. He
apologizeTand said that he was sure that the mis-
understanding could be cleared up and we could
catch a later flight to Paris. The flight took off
with Qur bags. I phoned Mukdar who was aston-
ished by the news. He said we , should come to
his house at once and that he would contact
Muhammad.

Hamid, no longer Jolly, drove to Algiers. He
asked who had arranged our exit visas. He seemed
upset when we mentioned the name of Mukdar.
He said that Mukdar would do anything to get
to the United States and that he should not be
trusted. It was his advice that we contact the
President's oflice.

Mukdar was in a state of agitation when we
arrived at his luxurious flat. He was waiting for
a call from Muhammad. After two hours the phone
rang. A long conversation in Arabic. Mukdar told
us that Muhammad had canceled our exit visas
for this flight because of the danger. ^V^ should
not have gone to the airport with that hippie
Hamid. Also the Panthers had a twenty-four-hour
watch on the airport. W,^ knew that they were
afraid that Huey Newton's men might make a sur-
prise raid on Algiers. In the preceding week a
Newtonite had killed a Cleaverite and a Cleaverite

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 293

had killed an Oakland Panther. Muhammad was
also trying to protect us against Interpol, who
knew of our departure. He warned ^js^not to take
the Air France flight to Paris. Mukdar gave the
impression that we^ were surrounded by enemies
and that Muhammad wasVour only protection He
assured us that we, could leave on the next Swiss-
air flight, in two days.

Back at the beach hotel i^ reviewed the dam-
age. All our clothes and papers were en route to
Copenhagen. Fortunately the Tuesday flight would
get us to Denmark just in time for the first lecture.
We felt enmeshed in a web of intrigue and
deception.

The next day was spent in Algiers with Mukdar
who labored to rearrange our tickets. He sent
messages to Copenhagen to hold our baggage.
Mukdar and I spent four hours waficing around
the center of town; he flirted with the Swissair
agent. Our reservations were confirmed for the
next day.

Toward sunset, I headed for the Cafe de la
Faculte which was opposite the university. I se-
lected a very visible table on the sidewalk and
waited, watching the dudes preening and strutting.
After twenty minutes the man I was looking for
appeared — the young official from the President's
office. I waved him over to the table.

With him was a young dentist who had given
me a ride one night when I was hitchhiking to
the beach. I asked the young official why we had
not been allowed to leave the country. He seemed
surprised and asked why I had not •contacted his
office. He said that there was no chance that we

294 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

could leave on the following day without authori-
zation from his chief. He suggested that I come
by his office at nine in the morning. He seemed
amused.

In the morning we^checked out of the hotel
again and taxied to the government building. My
young friend began questioning me about who
had made the unauthorized arrangements. I told
him that I was not an informer, that the gov-
ernment knew very well what we had been doing
and whom we had seen. He nodded in agreement.
Again he asked why I had not made arrangements
with his office. With some impatience I said that
we had been in Algeria for seven months waiting
for the help that had been promised, that they
knew very well that we had lived quietly and had
never initiated contacts with any Algerians.
Politics here is complicated, I said, and perhaps
I have been too naive. He smiled and said that
n^ve is precisely the word that he had in mind.
Then he added, sometimes, if you have nothing
to hide naivete is the best policy.

He made a phone call and told me to proceed
to the airport. I asked him to stamp our pass-
ports with exit visas. He said there was not enough
time. He smiled warmly and wished me bon
voyage and safe return.

The scene at the airport was a duplicate of the
first attempt. The Commander and an assistant
stood at the exit gate. As we^ approached the
Commander came up to us, smiled, and shook my
hand. I felt love and sorrow. A Panther woman
looked at us with tenderness and kissed iJsi:^
When we^got to the gate again the search for the

CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND 295

missing visas, again the wait in the chair. Fifteen
minutes to go. Ten minutes to go. Again the
huddle in the chiefs office. Telephone calls. He
came out to apologize. I am a very small man here
he said. Five minutes to go. Pressure building.
Exactly one minutes before departure the chief
rushed up and waved us through to the departing
lounge. Whew.

We were given a nervous body search before
entering the plane. After takeoff the ship headed
north across the Mediterranean, toward Switzer-
land where we faced the next deal of the cards.

The flight plan called for us to switch planes in
Geneva for Zurich. It was a tense moment when
the plane hit Swiss turf. \Ve were in Interpol ter-
ritory. We knew about that big book in every
international airport containing the names of
wanted persons. We were traveling on Qur own
passports this time. And gur arrival in Copen-
hagen couldn't have been more advertised. Mario
had warned us that press and pohce were waiting
for the Sunday plane ,we^ had missed. Wej)lanned
to stay in the international transit zone of the
Geneva and Zurich airports until the flight to
Denmark.

As ^ entered the terminal in Geneva we heard
the PA system calling Mr. McMillan, the code
name ^ had given to Mario. The information
desk gave us a number to call in Madrid. Wjq
went to the sleek, marble, neon, stainless steel
Swiss telephone office. The clerk took the number
and directed me to booth seven. He and Christina
had left Copenhagen. The place was 'too hot. The
airport was swarming with pigs and photographers.

296 CONFESSIONS OF A HOPE FIEND

The university was steaming in controversy over
our arrival. Cleaver sympathizers would attack us.
Newton supporters would defend us. Right-wing
groups were outraged. Freaks had prepared wel-
coming posters. American narcs were waiting.
He advised jis, to stay in Geneva with his friends.
He said that we might be contacted at the airport
by a colleague who could help us. I agreed to
follow his advice. He was to wire Copenhagen to
advise that we would not be arriving for the
lecture. "**

I left the phone booth. She was waiting. A man
emerged from booth eight and approached us^ He
was tall as a giant, silver-white hair swept into a
leonine mane, face radiant with regal benevolence.
He spoke to us, in rapid Parisian French. It was
Goldfinger welcoming us^ to new life in Switzer-
land, l^d of freedom.

July 7, 1972
Zurich

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IfimUqfLeaiy

Fugitive philosopher • EstabHshment gadfly

Religious leader • Tarnished angel of the academK;

community • Noted clinical psychologist

Major anti-war spokesman • Creator of the LSD

drug culture • Whether you damn him as a

scoundrel or praise him as a revolutionary

hero, his sto-T has the stirring ring

of history in the making.

CkHifessions of a Hope Hei

The impact of this book
will be felt for years to some!